Yet Another Hero
by Whack Cat
Summary: Heroes come in all different kinds of shapes and sizes. They're always kind, helpful, and dependable. This isn't one of those heroes. Cain Doeet, a hero experienced in the point-and-click adventure genre, ends up in a big mess that may end up with the world weighing on his shoulders. Again. And he may even end up making some new friends along the way. Maybe. Hopefully. No.
1. Chapter 1 - Cain and Beginnings

What do people like? Heroes. That's what people like. And in this world of monsters and freaks that want to take over the world, that's what people look up to. Heroes that can punch through a twenty-foot dragon without even blinking. Heroes that can lift boulders with just their pinky fingers and not even break a sweat. Heroes that can take on the impossible and end up coming out on top. That's the stuff that people like.

But those are action heroes. What about those puzzle heroes that can figure out how to reroute an entire drainage system with just the parts they've got without having to get new ones? What about those platformer heroes that can bound ten feet in the air and land without spraining their ankle? What about those strategy heroes that can command an entire army against an unending hoard and end up driving them back? And what about those point-and-click heroes that end up saving the world from threats that no one even knows about?

Judging from that last sentence, you've probably guessed which hero I am. That's right, the hero of this story isn't some shmuck that can beat a monster in with his own bare fists. Or be able to use any of those flashy moves or wield impossibly large weapons. Nope, I'm just your average point-and-click hero.

Oh yeah, still haven't introduced myself. Name's Cain Doeet. I wear a large black duster coat with a short red scarf around my neck and a black and red rimmed beanie on my head. For the rest, I have a red long sleeved shirt, black jeans, red socks and black boots. Oh yeah, and for facial details, I have red eyes and black hair with the bangs colored red. If you looked at me, you would have assumed that I'm just some weird hobo with an affinity for black and red. Well you'd be half right. As the main importance is on action heroes, quests that ask for finding some rare, well-guarded object isn't always on the quest board. So the only other option is to do normal, everyday work. Like work at an item or weapon shop. But since I'm a point-and-click hero, I don't ever work.

No, for me, I usually work with whatever objects I can get my hands on to support myself. Plastic cups, nuts and bolts left on the ground, empty bullet shells, anything that isn't nailed down. I can use anything if I can get my hands on it. I think those "professionals" at those mental hospitals call it, "kleptomania," or something. Speaking of which, I once escaped a mental hospital by using my toenails as makeshift screwdrivers. Yeah, let that roll around in your head a little bit.

Anyways, for me, life is just one adventure after another. Start off by finding something that seems out of the ordinary, get chased by a bunch of goons that want it back, end up stopping them and then end up saving the world. And no one's the wiser. And that's the big issue. With those action heroes, they pull off some flashy moves, guzzle down some health potions, spend several hours pointlessly grinding, and end up saving the world with a big parade in their honor.

And for me? I end up nearly getting my throat cut by a crazy hobo with some rusty hedge clippers, use a pair of granny panties and a makeshift fishing rod to get a key from a poisonous dogoo, and end up having to talk an insane mall Santa out of blowing up the suburb. And what do I get? Nothing. No one ever knows I end up saving them, because its all, "Cain, you can't just take my egg beater without reason! Cain, you can't poison my dog so that you can get a squeaky toy from his dog house! Cain, you can't enter my secret underground laser guarded laboratory without asking!" It's as if they don't respect me for all that I do for them out of the goodness of my heart.

Speaking about the goodness of my heart, that's what ended me up in another great situation. Another situation that's going to end up in me making new friends, alienating those friends, and then saving the world without even a thank you or a pat on the back. And it all started at an ice cream parlor with some weird little kid in a yellow and black jacket.

After managing to gain some change from the local fountain by distracting the guards by framing a guy for breaking a window, I took my well-earned wet change to a local ice cream parlor. I ordered a medium chocolate milkshake with fudge and whipped cream as the toppings. Even thinking about it makes my mouth water. I dive into it, savoring each bite when some weird little kid walks over.

The kid is wearing a black and yellow jacket with some stars on her sleeves. The ends of the arms and her collar are covered with some white fluff and her shoes are white and red with some black on the sides. Her hairs adorned with two red bobbles that I'm guessing hold her hair back. If you're wondering why I'm going into such detail about her appearance, it's because as a point-and-click hero, its best to be able to recognize someone that you'll most likely see again down the line.

The kid stares at me with her big blue eyes and ends up taking a seat at my table. Curious, I decided to kindly ask her why she's sitting at my table.

"Hey kid, why you bothering me while I eat?" As I said that, I remembered I barely have any shred of kindness in me.

"I dunno. Just sitting," the kid says, kicking her feet from her chair. It seemed that she wandered here alone and her parents aren't anywhere nearby looking for her. Now even though I'm a self-centered jerk that doesn't care about anyone other than myself, I knew that just letting a kid wander around without supervision is bad news. Especially after I heard about that fat dinosaur freak nabbing up little girls. The image of that guy grabbing this kid sent shivers down my spine. Yeugh.

"Where are your parents?"

"They're not here," the kid says, acting like it's not unusual for her to be alone. The answer makes me wonder what her parents are like.

"Well do you have any siblings? Or friends? Or people that give a crap about where you are?"

"Oh yeah, they're around here somewhere."

Now I'm worried. The kids just acting like leaving her friends or family that must be worried sick about her as if it was nothing. Deciding to make myself useful, I offer the kid if she wants me to help her find her friends. Maybe I'll get something in return for returning her. "Hey kid, you need help finding your friends? They're probably worried about you. Probably."

"Hmmmm." The kid goes into some kind of deep thought process as she moves her head back and forth. She looked like one of those cheap bobble heads you find at those weird ma and pa thrift stores. Hopefully she'll be able to understand that I just want to get her back to her friends, but not figure out that I hope to get something in return.

"OK!" I sigh to myself, and imagine that this must be the start to a short and simple adven… "But first I want some ice cream!" Of course, an adventure can't start without a tutorial sequence. Figures.

A waiter walks over and asks the kid what she wants to order. "I want a large double chocolate and vanilla sundae with hot fudge, sprinkles, nuts, powdered sugar, topped with whipped cream and a cherry!" As the waiter writes it down, I start to regret offering to help this kid. Fortunately, I have enough change to cover it, except for a dollar.

"Oh uh, give me a minute," I say to the waiter, sheepishly. "I have an extra dollar around here somewhere." The waiter walks off and, as one of the perks of being a point-and-click hero, puzzles take place in extended time and the solution is always nearby, yet contrived. As the waiter walks away, I glance around, looking for a spare dollar, or better yet, something that can act as a makeshift dollar.

Oh good, the guy behind me has a dollar peeking out of his back pocket. I just need to grab it and pay the…

"Wait a minute," the kid pipes in, interrupting me. "Isn't that stealing?"

The kid looks at me with her blue eyes as I turn around and roll my red eyes at her. "No, it's just borrowing."

"But it looks like stealing. Don't steal! It's wrong!" I should have known that it wouldn't be that simple for a tutorial puzzle. This is obviously leading me into a dialogue puzzle where I need to distract the kid. Thinking of a good distraction, I point behind the kid with my finger.

"Kid, look! It's a three headed dogoo!" Alright, so thinking of something good isn't a strong suit of mine, but I hope it distracts the kid.

"Really! Where?" The kid turns around in her seat and looks behind her, turning away from me. "Where is it? I've never seen a three headed dogoo before!" Oh yeah, I forgot. Kids are incredibly dumb and gullible. Anyways, I turn back to the man and swipe the dollar from his pocket, pocketing it in my inventory. The kid turns around just as I put it in my pocket. "I didn't see any dogoo!"

"Oh, you just missed it. Sorry kid."

"Aww, I really wanted to see it. If you see another one, could you show it to me?"

"Yeah, yeah, sure. Maybe I'll catch it having a tea party with a dragon or something." Man, kids are dumb. I take out the dollar from my inventory and place it on the table with the rest of the change I have and call the waiter over. "Hey, we'll have that sundae now!"

"Coming right up," the waiter says, taking the money. A minute later, the waiter comes back with the sundae and a spoon and sets it down on the table. "Please enjoy your meal." The waiter bows and then leaves, just as the kid digs into the large sundae. It seems like she's going to be at it for a little while so I decide to ask her some questions about her friends and family. Another useful thing to note for point-and-click heroes, always ask questions. Even if they seem pointless.

"So kid, where are your friends exactly?"

The kid pauses from eating her ice cream that barely looks like it's been eaten at all despite the large scoops she's been eating and looks at me. That's another one of the perks of being a point-and-click hero. You can take all the time in the world to ask someone a question and it's like time never passed. "Oh, they're around." The kid then goes back to eating again as I think of another question to ask her.

"Do they know where you are?"

Again, the kid stops eating and looks at me. "No. I don't think so." Blunt answer from a blunt kid. Should have expected it. Looking at the ice cream again, it seems to have shrunk to half of its original size.

"Don't you think they're worried about you?"

The kid stops eating again, this time with some of the ice cream on her lips. "Yeah, but they always find me. They always do." She then goes back to eating her ice cream which has just shrunk down to filling the rest of the bowl. Deciding this conversation is drawing to a close, I ask her if we can go find her friends now in the kindest way I can put it.

"Alright kid, you done? Can we go find your friends now? You eating that ice cream like that is making me sick." The kid finished her ice cream, burping and putting the spoon down in the bowl. She lies back and pats her full stomach and lets out a cold, gleeful sigh, ignoring my question. I really hope that I get paid well for this. I don't think I can stand this kid any longer.

Just then, across from the ice cream shop, a purple haired girl wearing a big white jacket, and another purple haired girl wearing what seemed to be pajamas, appeared. They were calling out some weird name and the kid turned her head to them. "Peashy! Peashy, where are you?" "Peashy! Please come back, Peashy! I'm tired and want to take a nap!"

The kid then perks up seeing them and hops out of her chair. "Oh! Those are my friends! I told you they'd find me! See ya mister!" The kid then starts running off towards them as I just realized my meal ticket is getting away! No way am I letting a kid cheap me out of buying her some ice cream! I hop out of my chair and give chase after her.

"Kid wait! Stop! You owe me for that sundae!" Yes, I sound greedy but when you're not appreciated for all the kind things you do for people and not get recognition, you deserve to be! I reach the kid just as we're half way to them and grab her shoulder. I slow down, gripping onto her to make her slow down so we could approach them kindly and not make it look like I want to…

 _POW!_ This kid just sucker punched me! And not like a punch that you can just walk off after a few seconds! It felt like a bullet train hit me directly on my solar plexus! I think some of my ribs may be broken! I fall on my back, clutching my chest, hoping that none of my broken bones punctured any of my internal organs.

"Yay! That was fun!" This kid is cheering as she watches me cower in pain on the concrete! This kid's either a demon in disguise or as mean as me! I groan to myself as I hear the pitter patter of shoes and slippers as they approach.

"Peashy! Don't go around punching people!" One of the voices seems to be scolding the little girl. She deserves it for injuring someone that wanted to help her! "That's rude!"

"Sowwy Neptuna. I won't do it again! I pwomise!" God, I can just hear that kid playing it up as if she's not the victim here. The person scolding her can't possibly buy that crap!

"Oh Peashy, I can't stay mad at you! Come here!" I can't believe what I'm hearing. That kid just got away with it! "Let's go back to the Basilicom and get you some pudding! You can even have mine if you want!" Oh hell no, I'm not letting that kid get away that easily! After I bought her that ice cream she wanted and helped offer to return her to her friends out of my own kindness! Hell no!

I turn over to face the girls that just picked up that annoying brat. "HEY! In case you haven't noticed, your kid just broke several of my ribs!" The three girls then looked at me, surprised that I yelled.

"Whoa, don't sneak up on us like that! That's my job!" The girl in the white coat holding that damned brat doesn't seem to even notice that I'm bending over in pain in front of her! Dammit, this is not my day! Even if it starts out well, it's never my day!

"Well it's your job to tell your kid not to injure people when all they want to do is help! Oh god, it hurts. I think one of my ribs is poking my spleen right now!" I feel like throwing up right now, but it's not good to puke in front of someone that's going to reward you. At least I hope I still get my reward. I'll be lucky if they even help cover the hospital bills.

"Heeeey," the girl in the pajamas says, kneeling down to look at me. "It's not nice to yell." And now I'm being scolded!? Dammit, I just want to lay it on them about how terrible their parenting skills are and how their child nearly killed me with her punch of doom, but it's unsightly for a hero to yell at people he wanted to help.

"Dammit, I just want to get rewarded for buying the kid a sundae and helping return her to you. That's all I want," I say with as much honesty I can muster because I am just done right now.

"Peashy, is that true?"

"Yeah! He bought me a large sundae with everything and even let me play with him!" That last part is a lie and you know it, brat!

"Really? Well, that was awfully nice of him." The revelation of me helping their dumb kid just got through their thick skulls. I think I'm feeling faint. Either from the joy that they finally got it or from the broken ribs. No, wait. It's the ribs.

"Well if that's so, what do you want then mister…" My eyes are feeling heavy now. I don't think I can respond to her question.

"Hey mister ice cream man, you okay?" Feels like I'm losing consciousness. Really hope I don't have internal bleeding.

"Dude, are you okay?" For the love of god, please let these idiots take me to a hospital. I don't want to die like this.

"Is it nap time now?" Never mind. I'd rather die right now that trust these dolts in saving me.

* * *

 **Thanks for reading my first attempt at a fanfic! Feedback is always appreciated. Hope you look forward to the next chapter of Cain Doeet's adventure with the Neptunia gang!**


	2. Chapter 2 - Cain Meets the Goddesses

*BEEPBEEPBEEP*

"Urgh. I'm too tired for this shit."

*BEEPBEEPBEEP*

"Someone turn off that damn alarm. It's too early to start adventuring. And yes, adventure can wait just a few more minutes."

*BEEPBEEPBEEP*

"Ok, that's it! I'm showing this alarm whose boss!"

I sit up and grab the alarm as it continues beeping, throwing it across the room. I hear it hit the ground hard as its incessant beeping fizzles out into silence. After I heard the satisfying shatter, I lied back down and close my eyes to go back to sleep. It's at that moment I realize something.

"Wait a minute. I don't own an alarm."

With that stunning revelation, I sit up in a bed I don't remember getting into. I blink my eyes to try to get a better look at my surroundings and immediately regret it. The room that I have apparently ended up in is decked out with nearly everything looking like a flower. The grounds covered in some kind of checkerboard carpet that's colored in green and yellow. Makes me feel sad for the people that had to furnish this place. Wait, no it doesn't.

For the rest of the stuff that doesn't make my eyes feel like they want to stab themselves for how stereotypically girly the room is, there's a large screen TV connected to some fancy game system that's located on a shelf holding the TV up. Next to it is a waste basket that I guess I could search for something useful. Don't laugh. You end up finding useful stuff in waste baskets. At the end of the wall, I see a cornered shelf filled to the brim with plush dolls of weird anime girls. I'm guessing they're handmade, because no one in their right mind would make those disgusting things.

As I stood up to look at the shelf in disgust, I notice that there are three dolls missing from it. Upon noticing that fact, my point-and-click adventure senses kicked in, telling me that this is a puzzle I need to solve to proceed on my quest for… Something. OK, I don't know what my adventure is yet, but I know it starts with finding these three lost dolls and returning them.

I glance around the room one more time, and I see the alarm broken on the floor. I walk over and inspect it, looking at the shattered plastic screen and metal parts scattered around it. "It wasn't my fault. The bastard deserved it after beeping at me." Oh yeah, another tip for point-and-click heroes. Always say what's on your mind. Helps get the point across that anything you do isn't your fault. I look at the alarm again to see if anything would be useful but no such luck.

I look back at the waste basket and decide to check to see if anything in there would be useful. "Let's see what's in here. This thing's just full of empty pudding cups. Who's pathetic and gluttonous enough to eat this many?" I pull my hand out and look back at the basket again, noticing a peeled off metal lid with the name "Neptune" written on it. "Well, maybe this tin lid can be useful for something." I grab the lid and pocket it in my inventory. I then walk over to the door, swearing never to spend that much time in that disgusting room again.

I walk out of that room full of insulting colors and end up in a living room area with much less insulting colors. There's another big screen TV on a shelf with another game system connected to it. I think it's the same one as in the bedroom. Sheesh, how rich are these people to own the same two things? I look behind me to see a green couch. And that damn brat. Did her parents decide to take me to their home? That's dumb. They could have at least taken me to a hospital. Come to think of it, my ribs don't feel like they're using my organs as pin cushions anymore. I'll have to ask them how they managed to fix them. For now, I should talk to that annoying kid.

I sit down on the couch next to the yellow and black coated kid who's holding one of those plush dolls I need in her arms and coloring a coloring book with some crayons. As I sat down, she notices me and stops coloring and sits up to look at me.

"Oh hey there mister nice cream man!" The kid looks at me while she holds the plush doll. Weird. Looks like her for some reason.

"Hey kid. Can you tell me where the hell I am?" If anyone else was in the room, they'd say that its impolite to swear in front of a kid. I say that they'll just end up using those words when they're older, so why not teach them those words early.

"You're at the Planepatuna basilicom, silly." Basilicom? I've heard of those things. They're said to be the homes of some heroes that call themselves goddesses and fight monsters in bikinis. Everyone thinks they're actual gods, but I just think they're rich spoiled brats banking on reputation alone. Thinking back on that, I probably shouldn't say that to their faces when I meet them. Eh. I'll probably just end up saying it to their faces in a passive aggressive way anyways.

So, this is another tip from your fellow point-and-click adventure hero. Ask as many questions as you can. It's important so you can gather information on where you are and they can drop a hint to a puzzle you need to solve. It also allows you to make up some funny jokes to make the audience laugh. And since I'm such a nice and selfless guy, I'll show you a few examples with this kid here.

"I just realized you haven't told me your name yet. Not that I'll ever bother to remember. I just want to know the name of the kid that nearly broke my chest."

"My name's Peashy! What's yours? Neptuna said you didn't have an ID or a HUD or something."

"Name's Cain Doeet, and yes, I can."

"Can do what?"

"Exactly. So. Peach Tree? That's a weird name."

"No, it's Peashy."

"Sorry about that kid. I don't call people by their real names. I call them words that sound similar to their names. Keeps the quick thinking skills sharp. And helps me not get attached to them."

"Oooh. I wanna try! Hmmm…" Peashy scrunches her face as if she's in deep thought. Makes me chuckle looking at it. "I know! Cane!"

"But that's just my normal name."

"He he! No its not!"

"Well if you keep practicing that, you might be just as great as me someday. Maybe. Hopefully. Doubt it. You hit like a freight train, you know that?"

"Yeah! I'm very strong! I even play fight with Neptuna sometimes! She looks silly when I punch her! Her face goes all 'bleh' and her eyes roll back!"

"My condolences to your health plan. So what book are you coloring? Or should I say, destroying?"

"I have a question for you. What's with all the questions? Are you a pervert?"

"Where the hell did that come from? No, it's part of being a point-and-click hero, kid."

Peashy cocks her head in confusion. "What's a plot-and-clunk hero?"

"No, no. Point-and-click. It means that I solve puzzles and use common everyday objects in convoluted ways to solve those puzzles in order to proceed."

"Do you punch monsters after solving puzzles?"

"Tch. No. If I did, I would be torn to shreds. For me, I make progress by using people to get what I want so that I can continue my adventure. In a way I'm a hero, but not one that goes around fighting monsters. Instead I stop evil overlords from vaporizing an entire continent with no one noticing."

Peashy's now looking at me as if I'm one of the great marvels of gamindustri. "Wow! I've never heard of a hero like you before!"

"That's because you're hanging with the wrong crowd, Peapod. Stick with me and you'll learn a lot more about the world than anyone else can teach you. And who knows? Maybe you'll be as incredible, handsome, courageous, kind, and self-righteous as me."

"Really?"

"Yes. Maybe. It's likely. There's a chance. Give it a few years. Anyways, I need that doll you have there."

"What for?"

"I need it to solve a puzzle. Basically right now, you're a NPC that has something I need to solve a puzzle."

"Oh. So if I'm a NPC, do I need to give you a quest or something?"

I could just say no, but my heroic instincts won't allow it. Also it'll make me look cool if I complete a puzzle in front of her. "Well for NPCs, they mainly ask for something in exchange for the item I need. Or I trick them into giving it to me."

"Well in that case, can I have some pudding? There should be some in Neptuna's kitchen."

"Sure kid. Then I can get the doll from you and your first lesson in point-and-click heroics will be complete. I'll go get it right now. Immediately. A few minutes. Give me an hour."

"Okay, Candy Cane!"

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you talk point-and-click style. And if you think that's exciting, well there's a lot more where that comes from! Okay, maybe it's not that exciting, but it's useful. After that talk with Peashy, I walk out of the living room and head into the kitchen.

As I walk into the kitchen, I spy those two purple haired girls sitting at the table, chatting to each other.

"So who do you think this guy is?" the coated one asks. "I bet he's some guy that fell through a portal into our world! Gasp! Or maybe he's some ancient hero that was summoned and he's going to help us save the world!"

The other purple haired girl in pajamas seems to be dosing off or not caring about what the other says. I really can't tell. She's holding one of those dolls that looks like the other purple haired girl. Did she make them herself? "Nah. He seems like he's from Lastation by the looks of it. His coat does look comfortable though."

"Gasp! Maybe he's here to build his own harem! I bet he's going to travel to all the other nations and make Blanc, Vert, and Noire fall in love with him!" I think to myself that if that happens, I'll kill myself. I ignore the rest of what the two are saying and gaze around the kitchen. The two girls are sitting at a large table with the pajama wearing one closest to me. She's holding one of those plush dolls I need, so I'll need to ask about it when I can. There's an open chair nearby that serves as my way to exchange dialogue, I'm guessing. Next to the pajama girl is a large fridge. I guess that's where I'll need to grab a pudding cup for Peashy. Eh, I'll grab one later. On the other side is a cupboard that should be full of food. I've only had some ice cream today, so I walk over to it and open it.

"Hm. Not much in here that's worth eating, but there's a yummy breadstick in here." I grab the foot-long breadstick and bite down on it, hearing my teeth shatter. "Ah, just my luck. Who leaves a stale breadstick in the cupboard? Feels like it's more stick than bread now." I pocket the breadstick for later and decide to sit down in the open chair, trying not to focus on how hungry I am right now. Eh, it'll pass. Heroes must be trained to fight for hours without eating. Unfortunately, I never trained for that.

"Or, or maybe! Maybe he's the author's self-insert character and he's doing this because he has no life!" Either I came in at the perfect opportunity or at the worst time.

"That's mean, Nep-Nep. Don't make fun of the person that's writing the story." I still can't tell if this girls going to drop dead any second of exhaustion or not.

"Eh, he's probably a loser anyways," I pipe in. "He's probably writing this because he has no one to be with and wants attention severely. How pathetic." I prop my feet on the table and lay back in the chair as the two girls noticed me.

"Oh hey! You're awake!" Coat girl's first to speak to me. "You were pretty knocked out there. I couldn't find an ID with your name and it seems you don't have a HUD that shows who you are and your stats."

"Yeah, that probably has to do with the fact that I'm not an action hero. Name's Cain Doeet, and yes, I can."

Pajama girl looks over at me in confusion. "Can do what?"

I point my finger at her and cock a smile. "Exactly." Ah, I'll never get tired of that joke. "So, what are your names?"

"Name's Neptune!" The white coated girl says. "And I'm the main character!"

"Psh, yeah. We'll see about that. And your name, Sleepy?"

"My name's Plutia." The pajama wearing girl says. "It's very nice to meet you."

"It's not going to be nice once you get to know me."

Neptune tilts her head in confusion. "What does that mean?"

"You'll see in about five seconds, Uranus. Anyways, this is a pretty big place you have here. Your parents must be loaded."

"Oh, we don't have parents," Neptune says. "We're CPUs."

"Oh I've heard about those," I interject. "They're mascots for their continent and government. The news and body pillows I've seen make you look a lot different though. They make you out as if you're these full bodied and beautiful women in one piece bikinis that can take down three dragons just by shaking your ass at them."

"That's because we're in our human forms right now," said Neptune as she sat up in her chair.

"We can transform right now if you want to see what we look like as goddesses." Plutia shifts in her chair and I see Neptune's eyes shrink for some reason.

"No, no, no!" Neptune suddenly freaks out as Plutia proposes that they change. "Maybe later he can see! Not now though, with P-ko in the other room."

"Yeah. You can show me your fancy disappearing act later," I say as I scratch my outstretched leg. "Your bikini clad assistants might be busy or doing something else right now if they aren't here."

"'Assistants?' We don't have assistants, unless you count our friends and fellow goddesses." Neptune scratches her head after hearing what I said.

"Whatever. I'll believe it when I see it. So why did you take me to your home instead of taking me to a hospital? You could have at least left me there and payed for the bills. And maybe leave a 'we're sorry' card with five thousand credits inside."

"Well isn't this how these OC stories go?" I cock my head at Neptune's question. "A guy meets a goddess, ends up knocked out by them or something else, and we take them home and go on a grand adventure with them! Oh I can't wait to see how this adventure goes!" Neptune bounces up and down in her chair as I bet she's just thinking about fighting big horrendous monsters and taking all the glory. I should let her down gently and tell her that I'm not an action hero. Just to save face.

"Yeah, not happening sister. I'm a point-and-click hero, so if you expect to fight monsters with me, you're out of luck."

"Point-and-click?" Plutia asks. "I've never heard of a hero like that."

"Me neither," Neptune says. "Is that a new kind of hero genre?"

I roll my eyes at Neptune for being so ignorant of my heroics. "No. It's just because all these action heroes take the spotlight so much, there's no room for other kinds of heroes. I've saved the world several times with no one even noticing. I've even saved the world before the local action heroes can get there and beat the villain to mush."

"Really?" Plutia looks at me with her tired eyes. I can't tell if she's interested or thinks I'm a liar. "How did you save the world?"

"Oh, I have plenty stories about them. This one time, I stopped a sentient computer virus from stealing all of the worlds game data and swapping them with Trojan viruses."

"Didn't the news say that Lastation's virus prevention software prevent that from spreading?"

"Only after I managed to delete the virus's clearance software by swapping it with a pic of a nude woman by distracting it with a chess problem. Another time, I diverted an entire migrating dragon colony from landing here with just a windsock and a tuba."

Neptune looks at me and furrows her brows. "Now I know that's wrong. Blanc and I stopped those dragons from reaching Lowee before they arrived."

"Well there were actually two migrating colonies during that time," I said. "I was in Leanbox when the second one came in and directed them to the PC Continent."

Neptune lifts an eyebrow at me. "I've never heard of the second migrating colony."

I pick at my teeth with one of my fingers. "Well I dealt with them before the news team I was haggling, I mean, helping, saw them. Anyways, another adventure I dealt with last week involved a shipping manufacture plant attempting to use boxbirds as replacement shipping packages."

Neptune looks at me in disgust now. "It's not nice to lie, you know."

I stop picking my teeth to look at Neptune. "Like I said, I stop those problems before they get too big and become disasters. It's not my fault no one's around to document how cool I am when I save the world. You can take my stories, or leave them sister."

Neptune rolls her eyes at me in disgust. It's always a good sign when you antagonize the mascot of an entire country. Especially when you wake up in their house after having their kid knock you out. I look over at Plutia as Neptune continues to doubt me. "So how was my…" Plutia looks like she's about to drop dead right now and is drooling on that doll I need. I carefully wake her by snapping my fingers in front of her. "Hey! Pluto! How was my leg repaired?"

Plutia snaps awake and looks at me with drowsy eyes. I can tell Neptune was worried for a second when I snapped at her. "Oh, we used a couple of potions to heal your leg. It took some time but it seems to have healed quite well." I make a mental note to myself to grab some of these potions in case I ever get injured again. Should be useful with how often that happens. Just hope they don't take up too much of my inventory space. It'd be unfortunate if I wasn't able to carry the equivalent of seven tires in my coat anymore.

"Well thanks anyways. Hey, I need that plush doll for a puzzle I found. Can you give it to me?"

"No, it's mine!" Wow. I never expected this girl to be upset about anything. She holds the doll up to her chest and grips it. "This is my favorite doll! It looks just like Nep-Nep and I won't let you take her away from me!"

"Sheesh, alright kid. Chill. Calm down. Don't blow a gasket." I tell Plutia to calm down and I spy Neptune cowering in her chair out of the corner of my eye. She must be really terrified of seeing her wife be mad or something. "I'll just grab it later when I can. So where's your bathroom? I need to leak the lizard if you know what I mean."

Plutia calms down and returns to her droopy look as Neptune seems to be breathing easily now. "Sure. It's down the hall to your left." She points to the open door behind me.

"Thanks, Puddle. I'll try not to make too big of a mess." I take my legs off the table, stand up out of the chair and make my way to the bathroom. I enter it and it seems to just be a normal bathroom. Kind of small though. There's a toilet, a sink with a cabinet underneath it and a mirror glued to the wall above the sink. Wait, why am I explaining what a bathroom is? Everyone knows what a bathroom looks like!

Whatever, I open the toilet lid and unzipped my pants and… Goddess' light! There's some kind of hair thing in the toilet! Nearly gave me a fuckin' heart attack! I zip my pants back up and leer down at the toilet. Guh. I hope it's not some weird shrunken head. Don't want to go through that misunderstanding again. Oh, it's just string. Did someone stick a doll down there or something? Whatever. I bet that's one of those plush dolls I need to solve that puzzle. I stand back up and examine the plush doll in the toilet.

"Yeah, as much as I'd love to grab it, sticking my hand down a toilet isn't on my agenda today. Maybe I can use something else to grab it." I look around the bathroom and set my sights on the cabinet under the sink. I open it and look inside.

"Let's see here. Old mouth wash, toilet cleaner, toilet paper, and… What the hell?" I pull out a plunger head. "Who leaves a plunger without a stick? This world's going to hell, I tell ya." I pocket the plunger head and look at the toilet again. "Even with a plunger head, I'm still not touching the toilet water. Who knows what's in it, other than some dirty plush doll." I look in inventory and see the old breadstick I grabbed earlier. I shrug and decide to stick the stale breadstick into the top of the plunger head and end up making a functioning plunger.

"Another helpful point-and-click hero tip. Combine things that don't seem like they go together to end up making something useful. You end up with all kinds of weird and useful shit by doing that." After saying that, I grab my makeshift plunger and stick it into the toilet. After some plunging, the doll is dislodged and is stuck to the end of the plunger. Eew. I shake the doll lose in the sink and put the plunger away under the sink. I finally do what I meant to originally do when I came in and wash my hands and the doll as well in the sink. I then wring out the doll and examine it. "Weird. It looks like the ruler of Lastation, but I wonder why it was drowned in the toilet. Eh. Maybe someone hates those bratty goddesses as much as me." I pocket the doll and leave. Goddess, I hope this puzzle's worth nearly ruining my only duster coat.

I enter the kitchen again to see Neptune and Plutia talking again. "So how do you think this entire story's going to turn out Plutie?"

"I dunno. Maybe with him ending up actually saving the world and all, like he said?"

"Without me? Ha! Yeah right! I think this fic will just end like all those other ones with self-insert main characters!"

"Umm… Have any of those other stories ever been finished Neppy?"

"I… I have no idea…. Have any of them ever ended?" I can tell that cocky kids having a migraine over Plutia's question so I guess this is the best chance to get that doll.

I walk over to Plutia and get her attention. "Hey Io. I need that doll from you so I can continue my adventure."

Plutia looks at me with her drowsy eyes and just blinks at me. "Sorry mister Cain. Maybe you can have it later. Or when I get another one."

Well I'm getting nowhere from just talking to her. Time to teach you fellow readers another point-and-click hero tip! At some points in the story, you'll need to make another character angry or distressed at you in order to get what you want. To do so, you need to be very careful in what you say, or else they'll revert to a calm state of mind. This will be the perfect opportunity for me to show you an example. I just need to get Plutia mad enough that she'll throw her doll in my face and I can put it in my inventory. And with that, let's get this puzzle started!

"Hey Put-Put, I want to tell you a few things." Plutia just looks at me confused as I take the seat next to her and begin my plan. "I must say, I'm surprised that your colorful room hasn't made Peapod blind yet."

"Well I appreciate the criticism, but Peashy doesn't spend that much time in my room, so I don't think it's an issue." Damn, I screwed it up. And on the first time. Let's try that again.

"I'm starting to think that you love sleep more than you actually love Peachy."

"What? No, I… Well that's rude!" Now that worked! See, all you need to do is know what buttons to push.

"I think it was great that you let your kid run off under your supervision. Shows that you're a great parent."

"Why you... That's not…" Ah, this is what I love about being a point-and-click hero. You get to see people blow a gasket if you push them far enough. As I revel in it, I notice that Neptune has gotten over her migraine and looks like she's ready to make a run for it. Eh whatever. Let's mock her dolls now! That should put her at the edge!

"You know, with how all of your dolls are hand-made, I have to ask. Do you really see Plushy that ugly?"

"Gh! Geh!" Ha! I can practically hear Plutia gnashing her teeth at me! This is great! Haven't gotten a reaction like this after I mocked that buff guy at the bar that stuttered! I then notice that Neptune has gotten out of her seat and is positioned at the door now. She must be really scared of Plutia being mad. Tch, pussy. Time for the finisher!

"You know; I have to admit. I think that pedophile dinosaur freak would be a much better parent for Pinky that you!" And that was it. Plutia stood up out of her chair, shaking in anger! Ooh, that was fun! Even if I get my nose caved in, it's always a good time to make someone truly pissed off! Now to just wait and… Oh, I guess Neptune left the kitchen. I always knew these goddess brats weren't really hero…

OH GODDESS MY EYES! Who the hell turned on the strobe lights! I cover my eyes to avoid blinding my beautiful eyes and rub them. After a few seconds, I peer through my fingers and see that the blinding light has disappeared. I remove my hands and… Why is there a dominatrix in the kitchen? This isn't the best place to be dressed like that. Especially with a child in the other room.

Oh, wait. I remember who she is. She's that… Come on Cain, come on. You can remember… Oh yeah. She's a goddess for some other country! Can't remember the name though. Oh well. As I look at her, I notice that Plutia has disappeared. I guess she's her assistant or something to keep the goddess and shape changing façade. Still weird why she'd have her show up all of a sudden. Oh. Plutia dropped the doll on the floor. Probably from when she drowsily ran out of the room for the magic trick to work. I'll just pick it up and…

"Gyah! What the hell!" That bitch just tied me up with a whip! Is this thing made of barbed wire or something? Really hope it doesn't tear my coat! Fortunately, one of my hands are free so I can just try to untie myse… "Gu-huh!" She just pushed me down! "Hey! That hurts, you know that?"

"Ooh, not a fan of pain, huh?" The dominatrix said in a sultry voice. "I can show you many ways to enjoy it." I'm guessing most men in this situation would be raring to go, but I'm not interested in losing my virginity this way. I intend to lose it with a close friend or someone. But since I don't have any, it's probably a lost cause.

Whatever, I just need to get out of this whip. I try to stand up with my free hand, holding myself up on the edge of the table when I suddenly feel a hard tug. That dominatrix is trying to pull me over! "I'll show you how 'bad' a parent I can be! You'll be calling me mommy for the rest of your days!" This bitch is trying to rape me! This is not a good character quirk! Why did that Plutia brat think having a dominatrix be her goddess assistant was a good idea!?

C'mon, Cain! Think of something! You don't want to lose your manhood like this! Look at your options! Ok, inventory items. Nothing that could help me here. Maybe try talking her out of it?

"Listen. I'm kind of busy right now and I don't intend to die by sex right now, so could you just let me go?"

"Not a chance, baby boy! I've never tried men yet, but you should be easy."

"Well that's just rude." Ok. Talking won't get me out of this. Think Cain, think! Let's see. I'm tied up with only one hand free that's gripping the end of the table for life. She's holding onto her whip with both of her hands and feels like she could pull an entire cement truck by herself. Neptune's gone, so I can't call for help and I doubt Peashy would be any use right now. So I think there's only one option! I really hope I didn't choose the wrong choice and end up with a game over!

I let go of the table with my free hand and am launched over to the dominatrix. It feels like I'm flying, but considering the short distance and who I'm flying towards, it's not a good idea to linger on that thought. Just need to time it right and…

"Now little boy. I'll show you how 'rude' I can…" SLAP! Just before my body hits her, I swung my open hand at her face, slapping it with as much force as I could. After hearing the deafening sound, I squeeze my eyes shut, terrified of what would happen next. Ow! I think I just hit the floor. Did she push me down, or did I fall over? I don't feel a foot snapping my ribs in half or my pants being undone. Hesitantly, I open my eyes and look up, seeing the dominatrix standing above me. Oh goddess, please don't let her stomp on my face! It's not hot, no matter what you're told!

Huh? She just… Sat down. Opening my eyes fully, I stand up and realize that the whip had come undone and is now lying on the floor next to her feet. I look over at the dominatrix, still terrified out of my mind. I see the slap I left on her face. Wow, I think I left a mark. It's all red. Didn't think I was that strong. I mean, didn't think it would leave a mark. She slowly lifts her hand and I flinch. Please don't fight me! This hot bod's not built for combat!

Oh, she just put her hand to where I slapped her. I guess the slap was too much for her. The dominatrix sits down in the chair Plutia was in. She must be surprised someone fought back. Don't see why though. I sigh to myself, thinking that I was terrified of this cocky dominatrix woman that couldn't even handle a slap to the face. I dust myself off and pick up the plush doll that Plutia dropped earlier. I wonder where she went. Wouldn't she run in here to help her assistant? Eh. She must be too prideful to drop the façade. Good thing I'm not like that.

I pocket the Neptune-looking plush doll and remember that Peashy asked for some pudding, so I walk over to the fridge and open it. Fortunately, there's one pudding left and no one left their name on it. Even so, I'd still take it if someone left their name on it. I pocket the pudding and glance back at the dominatrix that attempted to fuck me to death sitting on the chair.

"So this dominatrix in a leather bikini ties a bladed whip around me, threatens to make me go out with a bang, and goes down in one slap? Pfft. Pussy." I leave the kitchen and head back into the living room area where Peashy has finished drawing in her book and is now watching TV. I glance at the TV and see that it's some weird anime show with girls fighting in loose fitting kimonos. Not sure if it's OK for children to watch it, but I'm not her parent.

"Hey Peepo, I brought you your pudding." I hand it over to her but she doesn't take it.

"Oh, thanks Sugar Cane!"

"You need to think of more varied names, Pish Posh." I hand the pudding over to her and she looks at it. She looks disappointed.

"Oh, I wanted Neptuna's pudding."

Wait, she wants someone else's pudding? Even I'm not that cruel to take someone else's food and eat it. Rather, I'd take it and give it to someone else then watch the sparks fly. "Why hers?"

"Her pudding's tastier and better than normal pudding. I always eat her pudding when she leaves her name on it!"

Ah man, she's looking at me with her big blue eyes again. I can't say no to them. I also can't afford to disappoint the only person that thinks I'm actually cool. "Alright, I'll think of something."

"Thank you, Candy Cane!"

"Yeah, sure kid." Well this is going to be tricky. Neptune ran off the same time Plutia sic her kinky assistant onto me. I doubt I'll be able to find her. And I have no idea where they keep the pens around here, so there's no way I can forge her name onto it.

Oh wait. I remembered I grabbed that Neptune marked lid form the waste basket earlier. I take the lid out of my pocket and peel off the lid on the pudding cup before I wrap the marked lid on top of the cup. Ha! I told you that going through waste baskets isn't a waste of time! I have no need for the other lid, so I just toss it. Someone will probably pick it up later. I hand the pudding back to Peashy, hoping that she'll take it.

"Yay! Neptuna's pudding!" She snatches the pudding out of my hand and peels the lid off and starts eating out of the cup. The plush doll she was holding was now on the ground in front of the couch she's on.

"Hey Fishy. Can I have that doll now?"

Peashy stops eating and looks at me with a smile on her face. I've got that weird feeling that I've seen that exact smile before, but I force it out of my mind. "Sure, Walking Cane!"

"You should really work on those names, kid." I pocket the doll and head back to the bedroom, leaving Peashy to her pudding. Now that I finally have all of these dumb dolls, I can solve that puzzle. I place the dolls on the shelf and wait for the grand opening and…

Nothing. Nothing's happening. Goddess' light, don't tell me I did all that for nothing! Dammit! I did not just anger some rich brat and feed another for nothing, did I? I kick the shelf end out of anger.

Wait, did something just click? And like that, the shelf slid to the side of the TV, revealing a hidden passageway. "Ha! I knew this was a puzzle! And mom said it was just hormones." And with that sense of accomplishment, I descend into the passage.

Kind of dark down here. Really hope I don't end up in that dominatrix's dungeon or something. Oh, it just leads into a long hallway. Guess this must be used whenever one of those girls need to duck out for their assistants to take over. … Did I do all of this for some dumb hallway? Goddess' light, please tell me I'm wrong.

"Ha ha ha! It's mine! All mine!" The hell? Is someone else down here? I walk towards the voice and come by a corner and peer around it and see…

"Finally! With this, I can rule the entire world! No. Not just the world. All of the dimensions! Ha ha ha ha!"

I think I found my McGuffin.

 **Hey everyone! Just wanted to say sorry for the wait. This chapter's taken up some time to get ready and I wanted to clearly show Cain's character in this chapter and how everyone else reacts to him. I hope this chapter does a good job in conveying that!**

 **Also, I am currently planning to update this story at least once a month. Twice if I'm lucky. Also, a cover for this story is being worked on and will be added when chapter three is added! So look forward to seeing what Cain looks like!**

 **And for the last author's note, I just want to say thanks for the follows and reviews! It really means a lot knowing that people are interested in seeing this story progress! Again, feedback is always appreciated and I hope you all look forward to seeing Cain save the world!**


	3. Chapter 3 - Cain and the Apple

"Finally its mine! All mine! Ha ha ha ha!"

The coated figure in the hallway keeps repeating that phrase as she looks at whatever she's holding. It's getting really annoying. I can't really get a good look at her with how dark it is past the corner, but she seems to be wearing a large grey coat and a hood to cover her face. By the voice, I can tell its female, but I don't remember hearing such an annoying voice before. Other than that time in Lowee with that Tekken freak. Either way, she says that she found something that can help her take over the world, so it's my time to shine. I take a look at my options and consider them wisely.

"There's no way I'd be able to take someone down by myself," I whisper to myself. "If she saw me, she'd surely make a run for it. I'll need to think of some way to get her to drop the McGuffin." I take a look at my inventory, but its empty. I think I should go back up to that disgusting room again to try to find something useful. Don't worry folks, she won't leave. This is one of those moments in a game where the villain will just stand around admiring their handiwork so you can complete side missions or get items without worrying about them leaving. I head back up the hallway to the room.

I exit the hallway and take a look around the accursed room. "Let's see. There has to be something useful in here that can make her drop that McGuffin." I examine the shelf holding the large TV up. "Maybe there's something in here." I look in the shelf and I end up finding a small handheld soundboard. At least I think it is. "The hell is this thing?" I push one of the buttons on it to see what it does.

"Testing. One, two, three. Testing." Neptune's voice comes out of the soundboard. "Hey! This thing's cool! Junior really gets me cool gifts on my birthday! This thing should be useful for when I need to record my voice for those announcement thingies that Histy says I keep putting off." By the amount of dust on the thing, I doubt it's been used at all. I push another button to see what the board says.

"Thanks for inviting me over to play with you, Nep-Nep." Plutia's voice comes out of the soundboard now. "I've really wanted to play that new horror game together."

"I think this thing's recorded over an entire conversation between the two brats," I say as I pocket the thing. "Maybe I can use those two mistakes-for-heroes annoying voices to trick that thief." After saying that to myself, I descend back down the hidden hallway to where the dark coated figure is.

"I wonder if I should eat this now and start my reign of terror," the figure says as I approach the corner. "No. It'd be better if I gathered all of them. Once I've got them all, those stupid goddesses won't know what hit them!" Good, she hasn't left yet. I pull out the soundboard and crank the volume high. Now I just need to choose the dialogue of those two goddess brats to trick her into thinking she was found out. She'll surely drop whatever she's bragging about. I push one of the buttons to commence the puzzle.

"What was that?" Plutia's voice comes out of the soundboard.

"What the?" The figure jolts her head in my direction. I hide myself behind the corner to avoid her vision. "Who was that?"

I press another button. "You hear that Ploot?" Neptune's voice then comes out of the board. "That's the monster."

"Those two brats?" I hear the coated person's voice tense up. "How did they find me?"

Need to be careful here. One wrong move and she might run off with the McGuffin. I press another button on the board and Plutia's voice comes out. "So we got here by that secret lever?"

"But I hid that so well! How did you find it?" Sheesh, this girl just won't stop asking questions. Hope this puzzle doesn't go on for too long. I push another button.

"Just had to push that box aside to find it." Neptune's recording says.

"Well, what are you going to do? I have this, and if you get any closer I'll eat it!" No, no, no! That's a bad idea! Bad idea! "So, what's your plan now?"

Hastily, I push another button and Plutia's voice comes out. "I'm getting really angry."

I hear a thud behind the corner. I think she dropped the McGuffin. "Oh no. Please no!"

I press the last button on the board. "Who's ready to get punished?" It's that kinky bitch's voice. When did she join them?

"NO! Not again!" I hear footsteps as the figure runs off, leaving her prize behind. "I don't want to go through therapy again!"

Smiling gleefully that my perfect plan worked, well, perfectly, I put the soundboard in my inventory and step out of the corner. I look at what she dropped and… "Is that an apple?" I pick up the weird apple and look at it closer. Strange. Looks like it's made of glass. There's weird glowing lines zooming around inside it. "Is the McGuffin of this story really a decorative paper weight?" Eh, I can't complain. Whatever it is, she said it could help take over the world. Maybe those goddess brats could help me figure out what this thing is. They've got to be useful for something other than being puzzle obstacles. I head back up the hallway to the room and exit into the living room, carrying the apple in my hand.

"Hey Car Pool Lane, what's that?" Peashy is standing on the couch and is looking at me.

I guess I should explain how I found it and what I'm going to do. Might make me look cool. "Oh, this? I found this weird apple inside a hidden hallway. Some thief had it, so I managed to trick her into dropping it with a soundboard of your parent's voices. And now I'm going to ask them what it is since they have to be useful for something other than world building dialogue."

"Wow, cool!" Peashy then hops off the couch and approaches me. She then reaches for the apple in my hand. "Can I look at it?"

"Finders keepers, Teapot," I say to her as I lift the apple away from her. "That's an important lesson to learn and hold to when you're a point-and-click hero."

"Hey, I follow that lesson too!" she says. "Maybe I can be a pink-and-clot hero like you one day!"

I pat her on her head and let out a small laugh. "Heh. Maybe. You would need a good enough tutor though. Unfortunately, I'm busy right now. Now where are your parents? Maybe they can tell me what this thing is." I walk into the kitchen with Peashy following behind me and see the two of them sitting next to each other at the table.

"You sure you're okay, Plutia?" Neptune seems to be concerned about Plutia for some reason.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm fine. He just caught me off guard is all." Yow. Plutia has a red mark on her face. I wonder how that happened.

"Well, next time I see that jerk I'm going to…" Neptune looks up and sees me and Peashy. I wave over to her. She glares at me. "You."

"Me." I say in response.

"Peashy," the kid says.

Neptune gets out of her chair and stomps towards me. Would be intimidating if she wasn't shorter than me. "What's the big idea of hitting my friend?" She points an accusing finger in my face.

I get confused by her weird question but return to my normal position as I push her finger out of my face. "What the hell are you talking about? I didn't hit her. I did hit her assistant though. All in self-defense of course."

"That assistant was her, you idiot!" Neptune yells at me as she points to Plutia to emphasize her words.

I'm shocked by her retaliation. "Wait, really? You can actually change into full figured women in bikinis? I thought that was all special effects like those Sailor Moon cartoons!"

"They are that flashy though," Peashy interjects.

I ignore what Peashy said and look back at Neptune. "Well, whatever. I have something much more important to show than apologize." I take out the apple and present it to Neptune.

"What the heck is that thing?" She angrily asks. "Did you think a fruit would work as an apology for hitting my friend?"

Plutia turns her head towards us and see the apple, making her eyes go wide. "That's a CPU Core!" She shouts. We all jump from hearing her raise her voice. Never expected her to get loud.

"A CP whatsit?" I ask. I walk over to the table with Peashy next to me and Neptune goes to the other side where Plutia is sitting. I take the apple out of my inventory and I show it to Plutia.

"It's called a CPU Core," Plutia explains. "It gives a person the powers to become a goddess. I ate one at a picnic and became a goddess myself. But why's there another one?"

Plutia reaches for it and I pull it back away from her. "Oh, no way sunshine! I've seen this play out before!" I hold the apple closer to my chest. "If I give this world saving McGuffin to you, you'll take all the glory and leave me out of it!"

"You can't do that!" Neptune yells at me. "That fruit's incredibly dangerous! If you ate it, you could turn into a monster! It's CPU property! It's our responsibility!"

"If it's so important, why didn't you try guarding it better?" I ask. "I found this in some secret hallway and stole it from someone that wanted to use it to take over the world!"

"Wait, someone else is searching for them?" Plutia asks.

"I found it and it's mine now!" I retort. "Finders keepers!"

"Yeah! Finders keepers!" Peashy says, agreeing with me.

"P-ko! Don't agree with that jerk!" Neptune yells out. "He's rude and he hit Plutia!"

"It was self-defense and you know it!" I yell back.

"You don't just hit a girl! That's mean!" Plutia yells at me.

"You were trying to fuckin' rape me, you harlot!"

"Harlot? No one calls my friend a harlot!" Neptune yells.

"He was doing what was right, Neptuna!" Peashy yells as she joins in on the yell fest. "He was just fighting back, like you do with monsters!"

"P-ko!" Neptune yells at the kid. "Don't call Plutia a monster!"

"Don't yell at your kid, you bitch!" I yell.

"Don't call my friend a bitch, you bastard!" Plutia yells

"Don't yell at my friend, you meanie!" Peashy yells.

All four of us end up getting into a big yelling contest to see who could sling the better insults at each other. Personally, I thought I was winning with Plutia at a close second with Peashy, until something flew into the room.

"What the heck is going on here!?"

Everyone turns their head to the new voice as I finish up a very well thought out insult. "…Spit roasted with a double side of fries!" I turn my head as well and see the damnedest thing I've ever seen. It looked like some small Barbie doll in a frilly dress was sitting on a floating book in the air. I ask what I assumed was on everyone's mind at the sight. "Goddess' light, is that a fucking gremlin?"

The book floating doll turns towards me. "I'm not a doll! I'm a fairy!"

"Whatever," I say in response. "Just nobody feed that fucking thing after midnight." I get a small giggle from Peashy and find myself giving a small smile to her.

"Now, what the heck is going on?" the apparent fairy asks.

"Oh, thank me you're here Histy!" Neptune's the first to speak up to the question. She runs up to the small fairy and acts as if she's begging. "This guy hit Plutie, stole a rare CPU Core, took my beloved main character pedestal, and hypnotized Peashy into loving him!"

"Those are all lies!" I yell. "Well the last one anyways."

"Neptune, I think you're being delusional," the fairy says. "Let's start from the beginning. Could someone…" The fairy looks around the room at everyone. She looks at Neptune, who's acting like this is the worst thing in the world, then at Plutia who seems to be on the verge of snapping, then at me. I give a cocky smile and wave at her and she immediately glares at me. "Could Peashy please explain everything to me?"

"Sure, Miss Histy!" Peashy says. "So, early this morning, Neptuna and Ploot wanted to buy some cotton or something to make pudding pillows! I got bored, so I left to go on my own adventure, like everyone else does in stories like these. Then I met this nice man." She gestures to me. "His name's Cain Doett, but I call him other names. He bought me an ice cream, we played chase, I punched him, then Neptuna and Ploot took him here! A few hours later, he woke up, told me he was a pint-and-clank hero, slapped Ploot after she changed, solved some puzzle with dolls, found a CPU Core in a hidden hallway, then we all played the 'who can be the loudest' game. It was fun!"

"'Point-and-click,' Teapot," I say to her.

"Oh yeah. Train here calls me different names too."

The fairy floats in the air in silence. I think she's trying to process everything. "Okay, I think I understand now. You said he found a CPU Core, correct? May I see it?"

I take the apple out of my inventory and present it to her. "You can look, but you can't touch," I say.

She floats over to the apple and pulls out some weird glasses. She then floats over to the apple and inspects it. "This is indeed a CPU Core. But why is it here?"

"I found it in some hallway where a coated woman said she would rule the world," I say as a response to her question.

"So, someone else is searching for them," the fairy says. "This could be troublesome." She puts her glasses away and looks at me. "If there's a CPU Core here, there must be others scattered around in Gamindustri. We'll need to find them and gather them. We can start with this one. Mister Cain, may we have the Core?"

"Don't ask him!" Neptune says. "Just take it! He doesn't deserve that thing! It's CPU property! Besides, I need it to become the main character of this story! It would ruin my reputation if I wasn't given main character status!"

She grabs for it and I hastily put it back into my inventory. "No way! If I give this thing to you, you goddess brats will just hog all the glory! I doubt you'll even mention me finding it!"

"Yeah!" Peashy says. "Finders keepers!"

"P-ko! Don't support that jerk!" Neptune says to her kid. "He hit Plutia, for me's sake!"

"He's not a jerk!" Wow. Is this kid genuinely supporting me? "He bought me ice cream! We played chase together! He got me pudding and he's my friend!" She walks over to me and hugs my leg. Okay, this is weird. "And he's a lot cooler than you, Neptuna!" And now it's heartwarming again.

Neptune stumbles backwards into a chair. She looks like she's having a heart attack. "P-ko. My darling P-ko said I was uncool. Oh, this hurts more than dying in the Conquest ending."

"Neptune, shut up," Histy says. She sighs and looks at me again. "Fine. You can keep the Core for now. All we have to do is find the other ones. That shouldn't take more than… Three months."

My mouth goes agape at her saying how long it would take. Peashy mimics my face. I think she's acting like she knows what's going on. I then start yelling at the fairy. "Three months? Three months! I thought you were action heroes! Not caring about what danger you get into! Taking the glory from everyone else! Ready to jump into action, and now you're just going to stand around and wait while the villain takes over the world for three months? Sheesh. I can see why those pathetic terrorist groups kept taking over."

Plutia slams her hand down on the table. "You got a problem with how we run our countries, you bastard?"

Neptune and Hitsy then turn their attention to her. "Plutia, please calm down. Changing into Iris Heart won't solve everything," Histy says.

"Yeah, and you don't want to get slapped again, do you?" Neptune says, panicking over seeing her get mad again.

"How many times do I have to tell you?" Plutia angrily mumbles at the two before yelling again. "He just got lucky! Let me change and I can show you! He won't be lucky next time!"

"No, no, no, Plutie!" Neptune begs. "I don't want to go to bed with stomach pains again!"

As the three argue, I notice that my inventory is glowing slightly. I look inside and see that the apple CPU Core is glowing slightly. I pull it out and Peashy turns her head towards me. I decide to crouch down to show the apple to her and suddenly a picture appears in the Core. Does this thing have GPS of the other Cores? Inside the apple, we can see a crystal eggplant hanging from a vine.

"Ooh. Pretty," Peashy says. She taps the apple and the picture suddenly zooms out to show where the eggplant Core is located. If this isn't convenience or a deus ex machina, I don't know what is. I look over at Peashy and she looks back. I give a sly smile and stand up, pocketing the apple.

"Hey you goddess layabouts," I say to the three that are arguing to each other. They turn their attention towards me. Now to show how cool I am. "You can all just sit around and let the villain of the story win and take over the world, but I bet I can gather all of the CPU Cores in less than a week."

Histy turns towards me. "That's impossible. The CPU Cores are a rare and valuable item to come by. It would be nigh impossible to find all of them in such little time with nothing to go on."

I let out a small laugh at what she says. "Hey, the impossible is what I do. Point-and-click heroes don't let the odds tell them what they can't do. I bet I can find all of those rare and valuable Cores and save the world in no time flat. All I ask in return is a simple favor."

Neptune steps towards me and glares. "What kind of favor? Is it a perverted favor, or do you want to become a god or something?"

"Not any of those favors," I answer. "I just want you and all the other goddesses to tell everyone that I, Cain Doett, saved the world. And that you and those other glorified goddess brats admit that you had nothing to do with it."

Neptune, Histy, and Plutia's mouths go agape, as Peashy seems to be excited for me. "We can't do that!" says Neptune. "If we agree to that, our shares would drop severely! Mine are already hanging on by a thread!"

"Well then," I say, taking the apple out. "Guess you'll just have to let the villain gather them all as you wait around and do nothing. As for me, I'm kind of hungry." I put the apple closer to my mouth as I open it and everyone freaks out. Peashy even panics and grips my leg in a death lock. I look back at Neptune, furrowing my brows to appear serious. "Agree, or else I eat this precious Core and you'll have two problems to deal with."

"Alright! Alright!" Neptune says, panicking. I pocket the apple and give my cockiest grin to her. I think Peashy teared a little. Hurts my heart for some reason. "We'll agree, but on one condition." Neptune approaches me and pokes me in the chest. "If you can't find all of the CPU Cores in less than a week, you give us all the Cores you've gathered, leave us alone, and give up on the point-and-click heroics like Telltale Games gave up on the point-and-click genre!"

Some may say agreeing to that deal is stupid. Many would say agreeing to putting an end to your life long work if you fail would be entirely stupid, moronic and dangerous. Everyone would say putting everything you've worked your life towards becoming and all you have left in this pathetic world all to look cocky in front one of the most powerful people in the world is stupid, moronic, dangerous, hazardous to your health, and overall the dumbest thing in the history of everything.

I shake her hand. "Deal. Now, before I go on my grand adventure to save the world and make you tell the world how great I am and how pathetic you are, I need to squeeze my lemon. I'll be out of here in around ten minutes." And with that, I leave the room to head to the bathroom. No doubt, those goddess brats will be panicking while I'm gone.

~XOX~

As Cain leaves the kitchen, I see Neptuna and Ploot give him a mean glare as he walks away. Oh yeah, I forgot to say who's talking. It's me! Peashy! I bet you never expected someone like me to be a main character in a story! Ooh, Neptuna's going to go nuts when I tell her! Oh yeah, right now she's talking with Histy and Ploot.

"Can we really let that guy go and gather those CPU Cores?" she asks to Histy and Ploot.

"We have no other option," Histy says. "If we refuse, he'll eat the CPU Core. And we have no way to find the other Cores until my research is complete." I giggle to myself since Candy Cane showed me that apple can find other C-U-P Cores. It's like my phone I got from Iffy, but shinier! Oh, but I don't want to tell them that. Pain needs it to find them. Huh. I wonder if he calls people by different names in his head. Maybe I'll ask him if I see him again.

"Well we can't just let him go off on his own," Ploot says. "Who knows what things he'll do if he gathered them all?" I think I heard her teeth grind when she said that. Iffy says not to do that. It's bad for them.

"Maybe someone can go with him," suggest Histy. "If we can get someone to keep an eye on him to make sure he doesn't do anything that could harm Gamindustri, we might be able to get the Cores back from him when the week ends."

"Well I'm not going with him," Neptuna says. "Who knows what would happen if two main characters joined forces? It could cause the entire FanFiction site to implode! Plus, he's a real jerk."

"I'm afraid I can't go with him," says Ploot. "I don't think he likes me that much, with how my other self tried to… Do 'that' with him."

"He also hit you, so that knocks him down a peg," Neptuna mumbles.

"I told you, he got lucky!" Yikes! Ploot's yelling again! Her other self's scary. Not the worst thing I've seen since I've had free access to the internet, but still plenty scary.

"Plutie, please! Not right now!" Neptuna says, trying to calm her down for the fifth time today. "Histy could go with him! You don't have to!"

"I'm afraid with my small form, I am not able to do anything to him," Histy says, looking down. "Also, I need to help keep our shares up since neither of you are willing to help raise them."

"Hey! I've been plenty busy keeping my relations up with everyone else!" I roll my eyes hearing her say that. Yeah, Neptuna. Going on surprise sleep overs with them really helps your country. If I was older, I think I'd be a better ruler than her. Huh. I think some of Walking Lane's personality is rubbing off on me. Wonder if that's a good thing.

"So, what do we do now?" Histy asks. "Just, let him go and hope he keeps his end of the deal?"

Oh! Oh! This is perfect! Since no one else is willing to go with Sewage Drain, I can go with him and go on a grand adventure to save the world! It's Peashy's time to shine! Not just be a side character to support a more popular character, no! Time to be my own developed character with my own arcs and personality instead of "young kid!" Time for Peashy to be in the limelight!

I speak up as all three of them think about what to do. "Oh! Oh! I can go with Train! I'll keep an eye on him!"

Neptuna looks at me and crouches down. I hate it when she does that. "P-ko. That's a really bad idea. That guy. He's mean. He's rude. Wouldn't you rather stay here where it's safe?"

I scrunch my face to look serious. "NO! He's not rude! He's a good guy if you get to know him!"

"I did get to know him, P-ko. He's not a good guy. I can't let you go with someone like him."

"But none of you want to go," I say. I need to convince her that I can keep a good eye on him. "He's never done anything bad to me."

"Who knows what he'll do if you're alone with him, P-ko? If anything happened, it would be my fault. I can't let you go with him."

"But he's kind to me! He got me ice cream and pudding!"

"He was trying to trick you, P-ko. He wanted to get rewarded from you. I can't let you go with a guy like that."

"But… But…" I need to think of something! I can't let this opportunity out of my hands! Who knows when someone will care to write a story with me again? "But he likes me! He doesn't hate me like he hates you!" I yell that sentence at her to show how serious I am about this. Neptuna looks surprised by this, she even stands up and backs away a little. Even Histy and Ploot look at me in surprise. "He actually likes me! Sure, I hit him, but he doesn't hate me for it anymore. He actually likes me! He even agreed and defended me when you yelled at me! He's not a bad guy!" Neptuna looks concerned now. She must be wondering if I'm lying. I can't afford to lose her trust in me now. I just need to convince her with one last sentence. A sentence so well made and concise, no one would say no to! "And I can make him better."

Neptuna looks at me with wide eyes. But not with those wide eyes when I play hit with her. Wide eyes of understanding. She stands up and looks at Histy and Ploot. They both seem nervous, but nod their heads to her. "Alright P-ko," Neptuna says. "If you think he's a good guy and that you can change him, you can go with him."

She said yes. She said yes! I'm so happy right now I could cry! No, wait! I can't! I need to be strong! I need to show I'm not a kid anymore! I need to show I'm mature and brave! I stop myself from crying and hug Neptuna's legs. "Oh thank you, thank you, thank you, Neptuna! I won't let you down! I won't let any of you down!" I let go of Neptuna and run out of the kitchen towards the bathroom that Cain is in. He just steps out as I run into him.

"Gah! What the hell?" Crane says as he reels back from me bumping into him. He looks down at me. "Oh, hey Peapod. Come to say goodbye? Never had anyone say that to me."

"No, silly!" I say, lightly punching his leg. Made sure I wasn't punching it too hard that time. "I'm going with you! I want to go on a grand adventure and learn from the greatest hero of all time!"

That seems to get his attention. He seems kind of shocked that I called him a great hero. Has no one ever told him how cool he is? He then gets a worried look on his face and looks back down at me seriously. "You sure you want to go on this adventure with me? Who knows what will be out there. Letting a kid get hurt would hurt my reputation."

"Oh don't worry," I say to calm him down. "You can be my guardian! No, wait. Even better! We'll both be guardians! You can protect me from all sorts of things that would hurt me, and I can protect you from all sorts of monsters that could hurt you!"

Cain puts his hand to his chin to think. I cross my fingers behind my back. Please say yes! Please say yes! "Okay kid," he says. "You can come with me. Besides, you could learn a lot from me. I always wanted a protégé. And a fan."

"Yay!" I cheer as I dance around him. "I get to go on an adventure!" We both start walking down the hallway to the front door. "I'm finally going on a grand adventure! I wonder if we'll uncover a secret underground plot! Or meet up with old friends as NPCs! Who knows! Maybe you'll learn some things from me, Candy Cane!"

Cain lets out a small laugh. "Heh. Maybe Teapot. Maybe."

"So where are we going first, Strain?"

Cain pulls out the CPU Core and looks at it. He taps it a few times and looks at me. "We're going to Arfoire's Eggplant Field, Peef!"

"Oh boy!" I happily say. We both walk out of the front door, ready for our adventure!

~XOX~

Neptune, Plutia, and Histoire stand in the kitchen in silence, reflecting on everything that happened in the short few hours that passed today.

"Did we just let a kid, go with a guy that follows a different game genre and was a jerk to all of us, to find some rare reality changing fruit to save the world?" Neptune asks.

"Yep," Plutia says. Histoire turns around and starts floating out of the kitchen.

"Where are you going, Histy?" Neptune asks.

"To make some calls," she says. "Not to the other goddesses, since they're busy with their own things, but I know of some people that should be able to help us with this."

Histoire floats out of the kitchen and into the Basilicom's main office. She floats down to the phone on the desk and types in a number. The phone rings and connects. "Hello? IF? I have a favor to ask you."

 **And thus the true adventure begins! Pretty sure no one expected this story to feature Peashy as the main character. I bet teaming her up with a guy like Cain was certainly a surprise for everyone!**

 **So surprisingly, I got this chapter finished pretty quick. Maybe because it doesn't have that many puzzles that Cain needs to solve, but I hope it met all of your expectations on what to expect from this story!**

 **Also, would you look at that beautiful original cover art drawn by yours truly? That will certainly give this story some more attention. Again, I'm really glad that people are enjoying this story! Never thought anyone would like a story with a character like Cain in it, but I'm glad everyone's excited to see how it progresses, especially since Peashy will be his partner for the rest of the story! Expect a lot of jokes from her!**

 **Again, thanks for reading this story! Reviews and feedback is always appreciated and I hope you look forward to seeing how Cain and Peashy save the world!**


	4. Chapter 4 - Cain and Eggplants

**Quick re-upload because I wanted to change a few lines I wasn't happy with at first.**

The walk over to the eggplant farm was a pretty uneventful one. Unless you count us riding on the side of an ice cream truck because it wouldn't stop for us and Peashy really wanted some ice cream. That driver won't be getting his license back anytime soon. Either way, we finally arrived at the entrance to the eggplant farm.

"Well we've finally reached Arfoire's Eggplant Farm," I say. "Anything to say, kid?"

"Don't call me kid," Peashy says.

"Sure thing, kid." We both walk into the farm and make our way to what appeared to be a worker picking eggplants in the field.

"So Candy Cane," Peashy says to me as we walk over. "Since I'm your partner, what am I supposed to do?"

"Well there are many ways to explain what a point-and-click partner does," I respond. "Some explanations are long and other are short, with each one more complicated than the last. So, I'll just try explaining it in a short, simple sentence that references a once popular series."

"Let's hope I know what it is."

"Okay, you ever heard of Sam and Max?"

She puts her hand to her chin and thinks for a minute. "Nope."

I sigh to myself over her lack of the finer things. I may have chosen the wrong partner for this adventure. Oh well. Better teach her the art of point-and-click to make this more bearable. "Okay. As my partner, your job is to observe our surroundings and make astute observations about the areas we are in. You also need to inject humorous quips into your dialogue in order to avoid the threat of monotony taking over the story, along with assisting in any puzzle situations by providing vague statements relating to the current situation or by applying physical violence."

She looks at me with a blank face. "I have no idea what you just said."

I sigh again. "You go around looking at things, make jokes, not care about what you say, and help me with any puzzles by providing vague hints."

"Oh! I'm practically a master at that!" she says.

"Then let's test your skills with this lowly eggplant worker here," I say as we approach the vegetable picker. "Excuse me fellow low income worker. My associate and I have some questions for you."

The worker stands up straight and turns to us. Well there's something you don't see every day. The vegetable picker was decked out with your usual garden clothing: a brown apron, a large hat for the sunlight and boots, but her skin was all grey. Even weirder is that she seemed to be around the age of thirty, but still appeared to be older than anyone else I've ever met. Must be the height since everyone looks like young teenagers. Either way, she really needs to get some sun. "Oh, hello there," she says in a smooth but venomous voice. "I'm surprised to see anyone else here. We don't get many visitors."

"You're probably not advertising correctly then," I say.

"Or maybe trying to sell eggplants in the country of a goddess that says eggplants are the devil's favorite meal might have something to do with it," Peashy jokes.

She looks down at Peashy and glares at her. "Right. So, do you need anything?"

"I guess introductions should be first," I say. "Name's Cain Doeet. And yes. I can."

"And I'm Peashy! And yes. I'm as sweet as a peach!"

"You might want to change your introduction a bit, Peachy," I say to her. "Could send the wrong signals."

"Well my name is Arfoire," the grey woman says, giving a little bow to us. I guess that's a usual introduction people around here do. "I am the owner of this eggplant farm."

"Artfart?" I ask. "I think I've heard that name before."

"Oh!" Peashy speaks up. "She's an evil entity that wanted to take over the world! She's tried three times, but failed each one!"

"Wow. Failed to take over this pathetic world from those useless goddesses must put a damper on your self-esteem. If I failed as much as you, I'd kill myself."

"That's pretty dark, Walking Lane."

"Well even if I did die, I would just come back," Arfoire says. "I've been summoned back to life two times to assist in taking over the world." She looks at Peashy. "And if I remember correctly, I kidna..."

"I-I have a question for you, Fartbark," Peashy interjects. I think she stammered a bit saying that. "Why's your skin grey?"

"Goddess' light, Tea Shop!" I shout at her. "You don't just ask people why their skin's grey!" I readjust my coat after yelling at her. That's a weird response. I think Peashy might have sighed when I yelled at her. At least I think so. I look back at Arfoire. "So, Carstart…"

"That's not my name," she says. "Is it really that difficult to pronounce?"

"Not my fault everyone has stupid names, Arfbark."

She grumbles and takes off her nametag from her uniform. She then shoves it in my face. "You see? 'Arfoire!' That's how you pronounce it!"

I grab the nametag and look at it closely. Yep. Just as I thought. It's a nametag. "Welp, this might be a useful way for me to remember your name, Airpark," I say as I pocket it.

"Hey! You can't just take that!" she says. "That's company property! Give it back, or else things will get ugly!"

"You mean 'uglier?'" Peashy says. I begrudgingly hand the nametag back to Arfoire and she attaches it back to her uniform.

"So, is there anything you need help with?" she asks as she glares at us.

"Oh, we're looking for a CP…" I quickly place my hand over Peashy's mouth. Ew. I think she's trying to lick my hand.

"We wish to browse your selection of picked eggplants and eggplant merchandise, madam," I say as a cover up, sweating nervously.

She raises a brow at my sentence but quickly lowers it. "Well, if you want to see what we have in stock, it's in our company shop." She points behind her. "Just walk down that path, turn at the second left opening, and you'll find it."

"Thank you, Airfare," I say as I remove my hand from Peashy's mouth.

"Bleh. Your hands taste like week old bacon, Stain." We both walk toward the store and out of Arfoire's range of hearing before Peashy asks me a question. "Why did you cover my mouth?"

"Well let's think for a minute, Teapot," I say, wiping my hand on my pant leg as we walk. "If someone had some powerful, world changing artifact that they didn't know about and you told them they had it, do you think they'd give it to us?"

"Maybe if we say 'please' they would."

"No, Peapod. If people knew about the Cores, it would cause a lot of trouble for us. People would be trying to gather them all or eat them to become goddesses. We wouldn't be able to gather them all if anyone knew about them. It would be like waiting in line at Taco Nep for two hours, order a large bean burrito, then have to wait for the toilets to be unclogged for the tenth time that day."

"That happened to me once. That was an interesting Valentine's Day."

We arrive at the small store in the field. Actually, it's more of a small rectangular wooden building next to a tool shed than an area. The store only has one window and is made entirely of low quality wood. Guess the workers here made it by hand. Next to the window stands a dilapidated scarecrow wearing an old sun hat and a ratty apron standing next to the window. Peashy and I walk up to the scarecrow to inspect it.

"That's got to be one of the saddest things I've ever seen in my entire life," I say out loud.

"Sadder than when the cute puppy and adorable children orphanage burned down?" Peashy asks.

"No. You could laugh at that as some kind of dark humor joke on Family Gal. This thing's just pathetically sad."

"Eh. Family Gal would make a joke about this scarecrow anyways."

"My concern for your television viewing habits grows even more, Pea Soup." We both leave the scarecrow and walk to the other side of the wooden store. We find a tool shed made of rotting wood along the side. This shed looks like it's going to fall apart at any moment with how poorly it's constructed. It's practically leaning on one side and the wood seems to be stretching with how old and rotten they are. If this shed's ever seen better days, I'd doubt those days came. I push on the door's handle but it doesn't budge. "Huh. Must be stuck."

"Hey, Candy Cane," Peashy says as she walks up to me. "Neptuna said breaking into someone's private place is wrong."

"Well think of it like this, Peach Pie. A locked door is like a present. Once you've opened it, you're gifted with a new and exciting area to explore for about two minutes before you leave and never go back to again. Unless the story's plot forces you back to it or you want to look at stuff and makes jokes about them."

"I didn't understand any of that, Cage."

"Just help me kick this door down, Pea Brain." Both of us start kicking at the door until the door unsticks from the wood and swings open, hitting the shed's wall with a heavy smack and making it wobble back and forth. "Congratulations, Teapot. You just learned a valuable lesson in point-and-click heroics."

"I'm sure I've learn a lot from it. Just as soon as I know what that lesson is exactly."

I enter the shed as Peashy stands outside. This shed's pretty messy. Tools like weed whackers, hedge clippers, and gloves seem to have been tossed about without care and the shelves look to be held up with just wood glue. "This place looks like my aunt's apartment. Has the same rotten wood smell too, now that I think about it." I spy a pair of clippers is perched on one of the shelves. I try reaching it but it's too high up. I kick the shed's wall, making the entire shed wobble again and cause several tools to fall off the shelves. The clippers fall down as well onto the small work bench in the shed. I pocket the tools and step outside.

"Didn't you say you'd need items to collect other items?" Peashy asks.

"There are many actions point-and-click heroes can perform to solve puzzles," I respond. "There's push, pull, operate… I incorporated my own action to the point-and-click genre."

"What action would that be?"

"Kick." I respond as I shut the shed's door.

We walk over to the store and let ourselves in. The store's about as well kept as the tool shed, but without the rotten wood smell. Might be why they have so many air fresheners in here. There's some shelves full of eggplant merch as well. They really seem hell-bent on pushing their brand. There's eggplant toys, eggplant magnets, eggplant pens, and eggplant hats that say Top Egg.

"This place reminds me of those highway stops with the glassy eyed gas attendant, rats running around the place with no worry of pest control, and the threat of everything bursting into flames if you walked funny," I say.

"Except here, the attendant's a glassy eyed rat that might burn the place down," Peashy jokes.

"I'm a mouse, you idiot." We turn to the voice and see the second damnedest thing I've ever seen today. A large rat was standing behind the store's register. Albeit if you looked at it closer, it looked more like a rat plush doll but without the long tail, snout, and beady eyes. In other words, imagine a rat drawn in a disgustingly cute chibi anime style and try not to throw up at the thought of it. We walk over to the counter to chat with this weird insult to nature.

"Hello there, ungodly abomination," I say. "My name's Cain Doeet, and this is my partner Pea Shooter."

"He means Peashy."

"Yeah, I don't really care," the rat says in a squeaky high pitched voice. If it was possible to punch a voice, I'd do it right now. "What do you want?"

"We wish to browse your store," I answer.

"Well, what do you want then? We have all the eggplants and eggplant accessories you'll ever need."

"Do you have anything else?"

"We only have eggplants and eggplant accessories here."

"Nothing else?"

"No."

"Not even a bathroom?" Peashy asks.

"There's the mop bucket over in the corner." He points over to the bucket with the dirty water and the half-broken mop sticking out of it.

Peashy looks at it wide eyed before turning her head to us again. "I can hold it."

"Anything else?" the rat asks.

"Yeah. Shouldn't you be poisoning the crops with your rat buddies, or is this place that open for minority workers?" I ask.

"If so, I'd like to apply for a job here," Peashy says.

"You're at least ten, Peapod. What do you know about working at a shit hole like this?"

"There's a lot of things you don't know about me, Stain."

"I'm not sure if I want to know more about you, Peachy." Peashy looks a little worried when I said that to her for some reason. Maybe that was a bit harsh of me. Oh well. She'll get over it. I look back at the rat.

"First, I'm a mouse, not a rat," the rat says. "Second, there are no rats in our eggplant fields, and if you see any attempting to eat our crops, the security system would have already dealt with it. And third, I'm a mouse! Not a damn rat!"

"Security system?" Peashy asks.

"Correct," he says. "There have been several thefts in our eggplant fields, so we bought a state of the art security system to discourage thieves."

"My biggest question is who bothers to steal eggplants," I say. "There's got to be better, low level stores they could steal from."

"You should know, Chain."

"In fact, I do know a few."

"If you keep talking like that, I'm going to kick you out," the rat says, barring his tiny pearly whites at us. Never knew this place had such a good dental plan.

"Alright, we're leaving," I say. Peashy and I then walk towards the exit and I grab an eggplant pen and pocket it in my inventory as we leave.

"Hey!" the rat yells. Damn. Thought he wouldn't notice. I really need to work on being more discreet about my item grabs next time. "You can't take that without paying!"

"Put it on my tab," I say as we leave the store and the rat. After we exit, I look around to make sure no one else is nearby and I take the apple Core out of my inventory. I tap it a few times and figure out where that other CPU Core is in this damned field of lost cause. After a few minutes of walking, Peashy and I find ourselves in front of the CPU Core. It's actually grown along with the rest of the eggplants here, so it's stuck to the eggplant stalk. I decide that now would be a good time to ask Peashy if she's keeping up with my lessons. "So. Are you keeping up with my lessons, Teapot?"

"I think so. All I really need to do is be like you. Rude, not care about anyone, and never listen to anyone's insults."

"Correct."

"One question though." Oh good. She's working on her questions now. That "security system" question was a good one. Could have worked in an insulting joke though.

"Is it wrong to have friends if you're a point-and-click hero?"

Weird question, but okay. "You can, but I prefer not having friends. They drag you down on your ventures and are a bother. If you want to be a true point-and-click hero Peapod, cut your losses with making friends."

"Oh." Peashy looks down. She seems a bit sad. "So, am I a bother?"

Ah crap. Looks like she's going to turn on the waterworks. Making a kid cry would definitely put a dent on my hero label. I should try to fix this. "Well, I wouldn't consider you a bother." Peashy looks back up at me. "You're my student in point-and-click heroics and my partner, so that's technically a step up from friend."

Peashy perks up from hearing that. "So I'm your friend?"

"If calling it that makes you stop crying, sure." Well that seemed to have placated Peashy. She jumps a little bit from that compliment.

"Yay! I'm friends with Candy Cane!"

"Yeah, whatever Peacock." In all honesty, her saying we're friends gives me a weird feeling in my stomach. At least I think it's my stomach. It feels full for some reason. Whatever. Must be gas. I take out the clippers and move them to the CPU Core.

"ATTENTION!" Goddess' light! A fucking eyestalk just jumped out of the eggplant stalks at me! Nearly punched me if I didn't just back up! "PRODUCE PICKING IS ONLY ALLOWED BY WORKERS OF AIRFARE'S EGGPLANT FARM. PLEASE PRESENT YOUR ID TAG OR FACE THE CONSEQUENCES."

I guess this is that security system that rat told us about. I pat my coat pockets as if I was looking for that tag it asked for. "O-Oh damn. I must have left it in my other coat."

"I thought you only had one coat," Peashy says.

"Shut it, Pea Soup."

The eyestalk looks at me again with its large unblinking eye. "IN EITHER CARE, AN ID TAG IS REQUIRED TO PICK THE PLANTS GROWN IN THIS FIELD. ANY ATTEMPTS TO PICK A PLANT WITHOUT AN ID TAG WILL RESULT IN EXTERMINATION. THANK YOU AND HAVE A GOOD DAY." The eyestalk disappears back into the eggplant field. I stand up straight and readjust my coat after it leaves.

"Well I guess just picking it won't work," I joke to calm myself down.

"Maybe that rat at the store has some tags we could use," Peashy says.

"You're doing a good job acting as a hint system for me, Tea Pot." I jab my finger in the air. "To the store!" I walk off towards it and…

"It's in the other direction, Plane."

I turn around and pass Peashy. "Just testing you, Peacock." We make our way back to the store area and make our way to the window near the scarecrow. It's behind the rat, so we should get a good look behind the counter. Sure enough, there are some ID tags in one of the counter's drawers. "Well there it is. Now all we need is a distraction." I walk by the scarecrow as I think. "C'mon Tea Shop, think! What would be a good distraction?"

Peashy looks at the scarecrow and points at it. "Maybe we could use this? We could dress it up as ChairFar and have the rat-man leave the store to check."

I snap my fingers. "Good idea! Glad I thought of that." Peashy just rolls her eyes at my idea. "Now, how are we going to make it look like her? It has the hat and apron, but not the bust, shape, and everything else."

"I can take care of it," Peashy says, giving a thumbs up.

I must admit, I'm confused on how she could solve this puzzle. We can't pick the eggplants to act as Arfoire's bust, nor are there any kinds of pillows or bags to act as her figure. "Not to be rude, and by that I mean intentionally rude, but how are you going to make it look like her? There's no other items around here you could use."

She giggles at that. "Just leave it to me, Chain! You just need to go into the store and wait a little bit." She gives me a cocky smile. Well I'm glad she learned that. Seems to be a natural fit for her.

"Normally the partner serves as the distraction, but I guess you deserve this much for standing me for so long." I walk around to the front of the store and enter. I think the air fresheners need replacing now. Smells even worse now. Or maybe that rat just "cleaned" the floors with his mop. Speaking of the rat, I look over at him.

"What the hell do you want?" the pest asks as he reads a magazine with a half-naked woman on the cover. I look at the window behind him and wonder how Peashy's going to make that scarecrow look like that biddy Arfoire.

Huh? A flash of sunlight suddenly entered the window. Did the sun set all of a sudden? I don't think so. It's practically two and I don't remember sunsets being that bright.

"Hey, you little rat!" Oh, that must be Peashy. The rat turns around to see the silhouette of the scarecrow and jumps seeing it, dropping his magazine. "Get out here right now! You hear me? Get off your ass or I'll drag you out myself!" The voice sounds a bit deep and raspy, but I guess it's a good fit for Arfoire.

"Y-Yes, Mistress Arfoire!" The rat jumps over the counter and dashes out of the store. Now that he's gone, the store's ripe for the picking. All I actually need is one of those nametags. Don't know what I'd do with an eggplant doll honestly.

I walk over to the counter and look out the window at the silhouette of the scarecrow. I must admit, she did a good job on modeling it after Arfoire. The bust is a bit big though. I should ask where she got the materials. Have to ask later though. I hop behind the counter and open the shelf with the ID tags. I grab one and pocket it in my inventory. "Flag, I mean tag, retrieved." I turn around to the window and give an okay sign to Peashy. She repeats the hand sign to me. She must be hanging onto the scarecrow with how high she gave the sign. I hop back over the counter and exit through the front door.

As I exit, the rat walks by. He looks mad. "Not my fault I misheard you, old bitch." He turns his head and looks at me. "What are you looking at?"

"A two-foot-tall living plush doll of a rat being mad over a simple misunderstanding."

He just glares at me and walks back into the store without a word. I walk back around the store to the scarecrow and see Peashy putting the hat back on top of it. "Nice job, Peapod," I congratulate to her. "Your brilliant silhouette disguise worked wonders."

She bows like an actor. "Thank you, thank you. It was my pleasure."

"I have to ask though. Where did you get the materials for her body?" Speaking of which, the scarecrow looks like it wasn't even moved. Other than when Peashy put the hat back on it.

"O-Oh, that. W-Well. Le-Let's just say… I, uh… I-I…" Oh, great. She's stammering like a high school student in a harem anime proposing to her crush. I should stop this before some other girl comes in, knocks me down, flashes me, says it's all my fault, and nearly tears me in two to share with the other girl. Never again.

"Listen, Tea Pot. If asking that question makes you stammer like a tsundere, it's best that you don't answer then. Just glad you did a good job." I think Peashy let out a sigh of relief after saying that. Must be glad I stopped her from becoming that abomination to society. After that, we walk over to the eggplant CPU Core again and I take out the ID tag. I take out the pen I nicked also and write down Arfoire's name. "And, there. Perfect replica, don't you think, Peepo?"

I show her the tag that I wrote Arfoire's name on. "Um, Stain? This say's 'Artfart,' not 'Arfoire.'"

"Eh, everyone's a critic. You're as bad as my old spelling teacher."

"Mrs. Nicalis?"

I turn around in surprise to her question. How did she know about…? No, wait. She must be her teacher. I straighten myself up to look competent as I respond. "Is she still around? I thought she kicked the bucket years ago." I pin the tag onto my coat and walk over to the Core. I take out the clippers and the eyestalk appears again.

"PLEASE STAND BY. YOU ARE BEING SCANNED FOR YOUR ID." The eyestalk scans my clothes and spots the ID tag. It zooms in on it before zooming back out. "ERROR. YOUR NAME IS NOT FOUND IN THE DATABASE. YOU ARE AN INTRUDER. PREAPRE TO BE EXTERMINATED! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!"

"Well that doesn't sound good." The eyestalk disappears back into the eggplant stalks as I hear some rustling in the distance. Does this place have guard dogoos? "Peashy, get behind me." She complies and huddles behind me. In all honesty, I think she'd be able to handle any guard monster better than me with how strong she is, but putting a little girl in the path of a beast that could tear you in half wouldn't be seen as heroic. I at least have some common sense! The rustling gets closer as prepare myself to grapple with whatever it is and…

A walking eggplant walks out of the eggplant stalks. I stand flabbergasted at the sight and lower my guard. The small eggplant spots us and walks up to my leg and starts flailing its little root limbs at me. Feels like it's trying to get my attention instead of trying to break my bones. I guess this little guy was to serve as an enemy encounter for action heroes, where after touching the hero, stronger monsters would appear and take turns beating each other shitless. But since I'm not an action hero, I can jape the combat system this world relies on.

"Hey, Peapod?" Peashy looks up at me. "You think you can handle this thing?" I lift my leg as the eggplant holds onto it with its spindly arms.

Peashy gives a salute and grabs the pathetic eggplant from my leg. She places it on the ground, backs up a few feet, and runs at it. With a swift kick, she sends the little bastard flying through the air. It lands fifty feet away in the field with a satisfying splat.

I whistle at seeing it fly. "Nice one, Peacock. You should join a soccer team."

Peashy shrugs at me. "Eh. Wouldn't be my thing. I prefer boxing. But Neptuna and Ploot say I'm too 'young' for it." She scoffs to herself. "I'm not young. They should know that already."

I didn't catch the last sentence she said, but I just shrug. "Well I guess that ID tag plan didn't work."

"So what now? Do we just leave and hope for the best?"

I waggle my finger in the air. "No, Tea Shop. Point-and-click heroes never give up. Even when they're faced with the impossible, there's always a solution." I turn around and we walk towards where Arfoire was at the farm's entrance. "It's time you learn the valuable 'sleight of hand' technique, Palm Tree."

We walk up to Arfoire, who has nearly finished picking all the eggplants in the front area. She stands up as we approach her. "Hello again. Do you need any help with anything?"

I stick my hand into my pocket, gripping the ID tag I have for my trick. "Yeah. I wanted to make sure I got your name right, Sofar. Can I see how it's written down again?"

She scoffs and hands me her tag again. "You see? It's Ar-fo-ire. It's not that hard of a name to pronounce!"

"If you want an even more ridiculous name, you should meet MAGES with a dot."

I pocket the tag again and hand her the fake tag. She doesn't notice the change and pins it to her apron. "Thank you. Now if you'll please excuse me, I need to finish this harvest before three." She goes back to work as I give a thumbs up to Peashy. She gives a thumbs up as well and we walk back to the CPU Core.

Again, I pin the ID tag to my coat and take out the clippers. I approach the Core and the eyestalk pops out of the field again. "PLEASE STAND BY. YOU ARE BEING SCANNED FOR YOUR ID." It scans me again and zooms in on the ID tag again. "YOU ARE A CERTIFIED WORKER FOR THIS ESTABLISHMENT. ENJOY THE REST OF YOUR DAY, ASPHALT." The eyestalk disappears again into the field.

I proceed to clip the eggplant CPU Core from the stalk and hold it in my hands. I then strike what I think is a heroic pose and hold the Core up in the air. "CPU Core! Collected!"

Peashy claps at my victory. "Da na na naaaaaaaah!" she cheers.

"Don't do that. It's overdone." I pocket the CPU Core in my inventory. With my prize in my pocket, a sense of accomplishment, and my odd partner at my side, we stride towards the entrance to leave.

Until Arfoire, the rat, and an army of eggplant monsters blocked our path.

"And where do you think you're going?" asks Arfoire.

"We don't know yet," shrugs Peashy.

"Well then," she says, grinding her teeth. "Maybe you can tell me what you were doing with my ID?" She tosses the fake ID towards us and it lands on the ground in a crumpled mess. "Thought I wouldn't have noticed? Ha! Nothing gets past me!"

"I bet your rat told you about your misspelt tag," I say.

"I'm not a rat! I'm a mouse!" the rat yells at us. "My name's Warechu! Chu! Does a rat go 'chu?' I don't think so!"

"Shut it, you rat," Arfoire demands to him before turning back to us. "Now, I'll give you one sentence to explain yourselves before I turn you into fertilizer!"

"Well we certainly didn't come here to take an ancient all powerful CPU Core from your fields," Peashy jokes. I turn my head to her and glare at her. "What?"

"You have a CPU Core?!" Arfoire asks in surprise. She smiles a sly grin. Hey, only I can do that! "With that, I could finally have my chance of destroying those pathetic goddesses again!"

"Well as much as I'd love to see those spoiled brats working in sweat shops," I say. "This Core belongs to us now."

"Is that so?" Arfoire turns to her eggplant monsters and points at us. "Minions! Attack!" The eggplants monsters start waddling towards us. Even with their small size and pathetic limbs, I doubt taking on a thousand of them would be a good idea.

"So, uh, Cain?" Peashy asks as we back up from them. "What do oink-and-fish heroes do when they're about to be beaten up?"

"Well, this is one of those end chapter sequences where the action amps up and the hero has to fight the villain off to proceed."

"Good to know. But what about the situation we're in right now?"

"Oh, well that's simple." I grab Peashy's hand. "We run like spooked shitless chickens!" I drag Peashy behind me as we run back into the field. We run towards the store and shed. There must be some useful stuff over there to fight these bastards off! As we enter the area, the store's doors open to the sight of eggplants rolling out of it. We dash into the shed and shut the door behind us. Right outside, the eggplants start shaking the shed, making it wobble back and forth.

"Okay, Cain. We ran. Now what?"

I look around the shed at the tools scattered about. An idea pops into my head. "Well that's simple. We Dead Rising this bitch!" I pound a fist into my palm to emphasize my words. "I always wanted to say that."

"Dead Rising? I think I played that once."

"Your video game playing choices fill me with discomfort, Peacock."

"Hey! I'm old enough to play them!" Peashy fumes at me.

"As long as you can grip a controller, you are in my book." I grab a weed whacker and place it on the small workbench in the shed. I then kneel down and grab some lawn mower blades and set them next to the weed whacker. "Hm. Gonna need some duct tape." I look around and see it stuck to the top of the shed's roof. No idea why that's there. "Hey Peapod. Give me a hand with this." Peashy walks over and I hoist her up to grab the stuck duct tape. She grabs it and I set her down. "I knew I kept you around for a reason."

"I also have my own reason for staying around," She says as she hands me the duct tape.

"What would that be?" I ask out of curiosity as I start combining the items on the table. I did wonder why she wanted to come with a guy like me on an adventure like this. Maybe this is a good time to get an answer.

Peashy seems a little anxious at my question. "W-Well, Neptuna and Ploot never let me go on adventures with them, saying I'm just a kid. Everyone keeps calling me that. I'm always stuck at home while everyone else goes on adventures to save the world with 'sell-inert' people that Neptuna jokes about when she's done with them." She sits down next to the door in a slump. "I just want to show everyone that I'm not a kid anymore. I want to show that I can be as strong and well-written like everyone else is. I-I'm not even sure if I can do that. Am I just stuck as a kid while everyone else keeps growing?" She cries a few tears and burrows her head between her legs.

I guess that's why she joined me. She wants respect, just like me. Heh. She sounds a lot like someone I used to know. Least I think so. Not really sure. I kneel down next to her and look at her. "Well, Peashy. I must say that's a good reason for sticking with me." She looks up when I say that. "You know what, Pea? I promise that by the end of this adventure, those goddess' know-it-alls will be kneeling at your feet, respecting you like a time traveler appearing in the cretaceous period with an jPhone in their hand."

She wipes a tear from her eye and looks a little better. "R-Really? You promise?"

"Of course, pal. Heck, you'll probably get all of the respect since I don't get any. Just keep looking forward to that, Pea." I stand up and walk over to the bench as Peashy hugs my leg.

"I knew you were always a good guy, Cain."

Well that's sweet of her to say. I grab the weed whacker with the taped on mower blades and present it to her. "Tadah! New combo card collected!"

"Are you going to fight all of those eggplants by yourself with that?" She asks as she takes a step back.

"Nope." I hand her another weed whacker combo weapon. "We're doing this co-op style."

Peashy looks at me with those weirdly familiar sparkling eyes again. "Really? You mean it?"

"Of course, Peepo! Now, some may say that giving a child an unwieldy, sharp and dangerous weapon to them is irresponsible. But when that child can sucker punch you in the stomach and make you black out, I say it's best not to let that happen again."

"Thanks Cain!" Peashy says cheerfully. "You're the bestest friend I've ever had!" We rev up our weed whackers and kick the door down, leaping into the army of eggplants and laughing all the way in murderous glee.

After about ten minutes, Peashy and I stood ankles deep in eggplant slices. As we reveled in the bloodless massacre we were certain was a feat to behold, Arfoire and her rat appeared.

"What the hell happened?" Arfoire yelled. "Those were all my eggplants! Now how am I going to make a living?"

"You could gather them all up and sell them as eggplant chips," Peashy jokes. I give a small chuckle at that.

"You think this is a joke?!" Arfoire continues to yell. "I'll make you a joke!" Oh goddess! That blinding light comes back again and I cover my eyes. Is this woman another goddess? I knew I didn't like her. Peashy squints at it and the annoying rat just takes a few steps back. After the light disappeared, Peashy and I were faced with… F-Faced with…

"Gahahahaha!" I burst out laughing! "Oh ho! Guh huh! Bah ha ha ha!" Arfoire just turned into a giant flying eggplant! Okay! Ignore that brat turning into a pussy dominatrix. Ignore the stupid chibi rat! THIS is the damnedest thing I've seen today! A grey woman that tried taking over the world three times just turned into a fucking giant flying eggplant! This is so stupid; I can't stop laughing at it! "Make _us_ the joke? Bah ha ha! I think it's too late for that! Gah ha ha!"

Peashy, who looks a little worried for some reason, just looks at me. "Uh, Cain? What do we do now?"

I'm so busy laughing to myself that it's hard to listen to what she's saying. I manage to collect myself for a few seconds to give her some advice. "D-Don't worry Tree Top. As point-and-click heroes, we can… Snrk! Jape the RPG system those action jerks rely on! We go first, so we just… Just… Pah ha ha ha!" I'm unable to control my laughing. Can you blame me? There's a flying fucking eggplant that's a story tall threatening us! It's hilarious! "I-I can't do this right now, Peapod! Why don't- Why don't you take care of this final puzzle? Y-You can do it! Guh heh heh!"

Peashy looks at me as I try to keep myself standing up. I'm holding my stomach from how much I'm laughing at all of this! Peashy thinks for a second and looks at the weed whacker I gave her. She seems to get an idea and carefully tears the mower blades off the end of it. After that, she tosses the blades off in a random direction. I think I heard someone say "ouch" when they hit the ground. I can't tell. I'm still laughing at all of this!

Peashy then walks over to the rat that's been standing on the side lines. "What do you want, kid?"

I manage to stop my laughter to see Peashy grab the rat and squeeze him into a ball. His tail's tied around him to keep him like that. She then walks over to me and hands me the rat ball. "Here, Candy Cane. Could you pitch this rat bastard at me? And be my announcer?"

It clicks in my head at what Peashy's idea is and I nod to her. She walks over to a pile of eggplant slices and takes out her weed whacker. She spits on the ground like a batter and easily lifts the weed whacker onto her shoulder. I walk in front of her around ten feet away and hold the tied up rat that's spitting out obscenities at me. "It's twelve to twelve. Bases are full, and everyone's on the edge of their seats. If Peashy the Puncher can manage to hit this ugly ball out of the field, she wins the game."

"What the hell are you two doing?" Eggplant Arfoire asks in some voice modulated question.

"And!" I pitch the rat to her as he screams like a pussy. Peashy swings the weed whacker and manages to hit the rat, sending him flying into Eggplant Arfoire's hilarious face! The force sends the two flying off into the air! I run up next to Peashy to see them fly off. "It's going! It's going!" The giant eggplant disappears from sight, leaving a small sparkle in the air. "It's gone! Peashy the Puncher just won this nation's Blanc Ball game championship everyone!" Peashy and I start cheering to ourselves, kicking up eggplant slices and dancing around each other. This is actually pretty fun I must admit.

After that, Peashy and I walk out of the eggplant-less farm to a nearby bus stop that was two minutes away from the entrance. We sit down on the bench together. "That was fun, Stain!" Peashy says ecstatically. "I've never had this much fun with Neptuna, Ploot, Compa, or everyone else!"

I give a heartfelt laugh at hearing her say that. "Well if you stick with me Tea Pot, you'll have more fun than shaking a well-endowed woman in a changing room!"

Peashy looks at me with a smile. "Really? More fun than that?"

"Yes!" I hop off the bench and take a pose. "The life of a point-and-click hero is full of humorous and entertaining events! As we venture to save the world, we shall laugh! Cheer! Mock those who aren't us! Slap those that stand in our way! Cry at the sudden twist that's been poorly foreshadowed over the entire story to make it look deeper than it already is! Okay, maybe not cry. More like, take it in for a few seconds then just continue on like nothing ever happened. Never the less! Peashy!" I point to her and she smiles at me. "By the end of this adventure, you shall become the greatest, most intelligent and most not-giving-a-shit-est person ever!" I stop posing and sit back down. "Next to me, that is."

Peashy smiles again. "Thanks Cain! No one's ever put that much faith in me before!" She hugs me and I get that weird stomach feeling again. "You're the best hero I've ever met!"

"And you are the best protégé I've had." I pat her on the head as she hugs me and we go back to waiting for the bus. "Do you know when the bus gets here?"

"In about thirty minutes."

"Hm. Well then." I stand up and look at Peashy. "Do you want to raid what's left of Artfart's store for snack food and soda to tie us over?"

Peashy hops off the bench. "You have to ask?" And with that, my partner and I walk back to the abandoned farm with a spring in our step and a smile on our faces.

Maybe keeping her around won't be so bad after all.

~XOX~

"Never thought I'd see him again."

Hidden across the street from the bus stop was a girl in a large blue coat spying on Cain and Peashy as they walked back into the eggplant farm to loot it. The girl, named IF, was assigned to keep an eye on the two to make sure they wouldn't try anything that could harm Gamindustri and retrieve the CPU Cores and Peashy when possible. While that was her main assignment given to her by Histoire, she had her own personal assignment with Cain.

"All these years and you had to come back," she growls to herself. "And you even roped Peashy into your plans like last time. Guess things never change with you."

As she watched, one of her multi-colored phones hanging from her belt started buzzing. She picks it up and answer it.

"Hello? Yes, there has been a change. Cain has just gathered another CPU Core. No, I don't think he brainwashed Peashy, but I wouldn't doubt he'd do such a thing. It'd be like him to do that. Don't worry Neptune. By the end of the day, you'll be playing games with Peashy again and Cain will be out of your hair." She hangs up and puts the phone away and looks back at Cain and Peashy playing hacky sack with an eggplant doll. "And he'll finally be out of mine."

 **I must admit, writing this chapter made me a bit nervous on how I wanted to present everything that people would be expecting from the story. Writing Peashy and Cain's interactions were simple, but conveying their developing friendship was a little difficult. At least in my opinion. Hopefully the next few chapters will be easier to write for. Kind of doubt it but I'll still work on making them as best as I can.**

 **As I've said before, I'm really glad that people are interested in my story with Cain and Peashy and I hope to get some good feedback from this chapter, so send in some reviews and tell me what you think! Next chapter, Cain and Peashy will travel to downtown Planeptune and meet Gust, Nisa, and Compa, so I hope you'll all be looking forward to that!**


	5. Chapter 5 - Cain and Downtown Planeptune

About two hours later, Peashy and I arrived at Downtown Planeptune. According to the eggplant CPU Core, the next Core, which looks like a banana, is located in an apartment complex. As we arrived at our stop, Peashy and I took a confident stride off the bus. And by that, I mean we were forcibly pushed off the bus and fell out on our asses.

"You'll be getting my hospital bills in the mail, prick!" Someone yelled as the bus drove off.

"Joke's on you, jackass! I don't have a mail box!" I yell back, getting the last word in. I stand up and help Peashy get up by grabbing her hand. We both dust ourselves off and look at the apartment across the road.

"Well, Peapod. This is the place. The next CPU Core we need is located in one of the apartments in that building."

"It's a good thing the Core showed us the room number of the apartment so that we don't have to go getting into everyone's apartments to find it!" Peashy said happily.

"It's also a good thing that you've been working on those exposition skills while we were on the bus, Tea Pot." We both walk into the apartment building and make our way up to the apartment.

We approach the apartment, which was numbered 415, and I try the handle. "It's locked."

"Did you think someone would leave their home unlocked, Refrain?"

"It was worth a shot."

"You know," Peashy says, acting confident. "I know who lives here."

"No I didn't know that."

"Her name's Compa! We could ask her to let us in if we find her!"

"TV, remember what I said about letting people knowing about our quest?"

"Yeah, but Compa wouldn't try to take over the world! She's nice! And bouncy!"

I'm not sure what she means by 'bouncy,' but I wouldn't want to risk her knowing about the Cores and take it. "Nah, we should just try to find another way into the apartment. Also, waiting for someone to come by and just asking to go into their home would be anticlimactic and would be boring to read."

"So what do we do?"

"We do it the contrived way! And in a more contrived and entertaining way instead of the previous puzzles at the eggplant farm. So, we just need to come up with a plan of attack."

"Like what?"

"I don't know. I haven't thought of one yet." We both leave the building, thinking on how we can get into the apartment. "Maybe we can get in some other way. Like in another direction."

"The rooms have balconies," Peashy says as we leave the building. "We could get in through that way."

I snap my fingers. "Brilliant idea Peapod! Glad I thought of it." I look back at the building above us and see the separated balconies. One of them is surrounded in a cage. "I guess that one is Coffee's. Guess she doesn't like winged rats messing up her property."

"She's actually friends with all the goddesses and doesn't like them flying in through her balcony."

"That's what I said." Well there's our entrance to her apartment. All I need to do is figure out how to get in the other apartment next to hers to jump to her balcony and a way to open the cage around it.

"Hey Candy Cane," Peashy tugs my coat to get my attention. "Is that a food stand?" She points to some kind of stand at the corner of the apartment building. I wonder if it's legal to put that there. Then again, when did I ever care about following the law?

"I think that's a black market," I answer.

"But it's not painted black."

"Your childish ignorance and knowledge of adult content befuddles me, Peapod." Well since it's nearby, there must be some useful items that can let me get to the balcony somehow. We both walk over to the odd stand and approach it. It seems to have been split into three odd sections, with the center being directly on the corner spot of the large sidewalk. There's a bunch of open shelves with different kinds of stuff on them and stretch down the two sidewalks. If you're confused about how it looks, well just be glad you're not the one looking at it. Peashy and I approach the center of the store where some weird girl was sitting behind some wooden counter.

The counter seemed to have been hand made, but was constructed much better than the entirety of the eggplant farm. Oh, wait. I should describe the girl behind the counter first instead of the counter. Well, she's as hard to explain as the store. She seems to be the same age as Peashy and just as tall, but is running her own business so she must be older by five years, I'm guessing. Her outfit is just as bizarre as her store. She's got some giant rabbit head that reminds me of the lagomorph Max on her head and is wearing some kind of blue apron-dress combo. She's also wearing some weird Mokey Mouse gloves. Wonder how she swipes credit cards with those on.

"Hello there," she says to us. Her voice sounds very similar to Peashy's. Makes me wonder if Peashy's older than she looks… Nah. Not possible. Who ever heard of a woman stuck in a kid's body? "Welcome to Gust's corner store! How can Gust help you?"

"I must say you've got the 'corner' part down well," I say.

"Taking the entire corner helps the 'corner' part stand out," Peashy jokes.

"Oh ho, don't make Gust angry."

"That's going to be difficult for me," I say to her. "So, what do you have to offer here?"

"Gust sells many items of interest. It's possible that Gust has just what you need."

"Cain Doeet hopes so." I look behind her to see a Lowee Ultra Hand hanging behind her. That could be useful in opening the cage. "How much for the grabber?"

Gust looks behind her at the Ultra Hand and looks back at me. "Oh, that object is very rare and delicate. It's said that only three of them remain in this world."

"All the better. If it's old, it should be cheap."

"It's ten thousand credits," Gust responds.

"Ten thousand?" Peashy asks Gust. "You crazy, fool!"

"Business is business," Gust says, giving us a cocky smile. Being on the receiving end of those really sucks. I can see why I like using them so much. "Take the price or leave it."

"We won't take the price," I say, flashing my own cocky smile. "But we won't be leaving it either."

"Gust will be interested in seeing how you plan that." She gives us an eye as if she's saying 'I know this is your only option,' acting like she's better than us. Little does she know, no one is better than me. I've smacked a goddess this morning, so taking a rare and expensive object from someone is a cakewalk. I'd just need to think of a way to get her out of the way.

After talking to her, Peashy and I walk to the left of the store. This store has lots of junk to sell. Even with one wooden counter and two shelves and a side-boarded up table, there's lots of neat things I could take. There's old wands, food items, weird colored potions, some large motorized can opener on the counter which could be useful for later, and...

"Is that a hand in a jar?" I ask outloud.

"Must be David Tennant's," Peashy references as she plays with the items on the ground. On second though, it's best I don't try to take everything from this store. I should just focus on things that seem useful. Speaking of which, I set my eyes on some weird fur ball thing with eyes on one of the shelves. I grab it from the shelf to inspect it.

"Hey, it's one of those Tattletail toys from when I was young."

I tap the thing on its nose and its eyes open. "Tattletail! Tha-That's me!" It blurts out. I guess it's charged up.

"Those things gave me the creeps," Peashy mumbles as she walks up to me and the toy. "Gave me nightmares when I was a baby."

"That's impossible, Pea," I say as I turn to her. "These things came out when I was a baby and were banned when I was twelve. You're ten, so how can you know about them?"

Peashy looks a little startled when I said that. She starts to act nervous, but still tried to look confident. "U-Uh… Um…" Oh goddess. Is Peashy going tsun again? I told her not to do that. "I-Internet?"

"I'll accept that." I pocket the Tattletail in my coat. Gust can't see the shelves over here, so she won't mind. There's a trash can on the side of the counter so I look inside that as well to find anything useful. I end up pulling out one of those clear Nepmas LED lights and pocket it. I then look back at Peashy, who was looking at me in curiosity. "Don't judge me, Peepo. You find all kinds of interesting things in the trash."

"Like you, Train?"

"Don't be rude, Tea. That's my job." I put the lid back on the trash can and we walk back to the front of the corner store where some police officer is standing. Least I think it's an officer. She's wearing one of those blue burets with an emblem and a blue outfit. Although, calling it an outfit is a pretty big stretch. It looks more like a blue corset cut in half and held together by two blue bits of leather. She's also wearing some tight brown leggings and some blue boots. Fashion's never been my strong suit, but I can't be bothered to mock it. She looks like she could snap me in half if I made a joke about her clothes. Well if she stands out, she must be a part of a puzzle to get into the apartment. Peashy and I approach her and I give a small wave.

"Hello there, officer."

"Oh, hello," she says to me. "Sorry, but I'm not an officer. I'm just visiting some friends. But I do fight for justice and am a member of the guild, so if you have any crimes to report, please don't hesitate to inform me."

"Well that's good to know." I look down at Peashy who looks like she's going to crack a joke about all the stuff we've been doing and she stops when she notices my look. I then turn back to the blue wearing woman. "Actually, miss…"

"C-Sha."

"Sea-Sha, I would like to report a crime." Let's just crack one joke. Been a while since I had some good material to work off of. "You've stolen my heart."

"Nice joke, bub. Like I haven't heard that twenty times today."

"But have you heard it twenty-one times?" Peashy asks her.

"No."

"Well now you have." Peashy gives a small smile to herself at her joke.

"I have another crime to report." Now let's see if she can help me get the Ultra Hand. "Gust is selling illegal merchandise."

C-Sha looks over at Gust, who gives a small wave and a fake innocent smile. C-Sha then turns back to us. "I must admit, Gust is taking up space that doesn't belong to her, but I'm afraid she isn't selling anything illegal that could get her arrested." I look back to Gust who gives another cocky smile to me as she puts up a "For Sale" sign over some potions she set out.

"Maybe not now, but just you wait," I say. "I have one last crime to report." Now let's see if she can be useful in getting into the apartment next to Compa's. "There's some secret camera on the building next to us." I point above us to the balcony next to Compa's caged one. Hopefully she'll shoot something out on the other balcony to act as a reason for Peashy and I to go in theirs.

C-Sha looks up at the balconies before looking back at us. "I'm sorry sir, but I don't see any secret cameras. And I should know. With ASIC trying to rebuild itself, I've been very careful in spotting them and taking them out. If you see anything blinking a red light, please let me now so I can take care of it."

Well that's useful to know. All I need to do is make something blink red and toss it up to that balcony. I've got the LED so I just need to color it red and get the battery from the Tattletail doll. I'll just need to get something else to hold them together. I look back at C-Sha and say goodbye.

"Well, See-Sha later!"

"Yes?" she asks. After that, I turn back to Gust and the "For Sale" sign she just put up over some potions.

"What are these?" I ask, pointing at the potions.

"Those are some experimental potions that Gust made. Gust hasn't tested them yet, so Gust is putting them on sale to see what happens when people drink them."

"What about the sign?" Peashy asks.

"The potions are for sale, the sign isn't," Gust says, glaring at her. I guess I'll just have to grab it later when she isn't looking then. Could be useful in getting the grabber. After that, I walk to the right side of the corner store as Peashy follows. It looks the same as the other side, with just different stuff in the background to make it look like the artists aren't copy pasting the same environment. The only different thing here is that some girl is crouched next to the boarded up counter. From just seeing her, I can tell there's a well thought out joke here.

"Hey look Treetop," I say, pointing at the girl. "A flat girl!"

"No boobs," Peashy says, also pointing at the girl.

"That's rude!" the girl says, standing up to face us. "Don't make jokes like that!" Okay, forget C-Sha's fashion sense. This girl's outfit is more ridiculous than hers.

The girl is wearing a full body jumpsuit with the zipper pulled down all the way to her waist. Wonder if she gets cold wearing that. She's got some large boots that go up to her knees, gloves, goggles, and a long red scarf that makes my scarf look like a necklace in comparison. Basically what she's wearing screams, "I'm a hero and you should know it."

"And you should!" Woah, did she just hear that? "I am NISA! Gamindustri's Keeper of Justice! Hero to all citizens and the nightmare of all villains!" She strikes some pose that I think is from some Lowee anime. She then jabs a finger towards me. "And who are you, mocker of justice?"

"I am Cain Doeet. Fellow point-and-click hero that brings justice without giving a shit." Peashy tugs my pant leg. "Oh yeah, and this is my protégé Pea..."

Peashy strikes a pose like NISA's. "I am Peashy! Hero in training and former godde-"Weird. She froze up. Her pose starts to falter as she tries to recover from that tsun attack. "God-Godly child."

"Nice save," I mumble to myself.

NISA stands up after the introductions are over. "Point-and-click? I have never heard that kind of heroics before."

"Makes sense," I respond. "Point-and-click heroes don't get much rep for how they save the world. It's like people have never seen a balloon made out of dried cow leather and being flown through the air with hot gas from Leanbox fair outhouses to stop a mad pigeon man from dumping pigeon poo on an ice cream eating contest."

"That sounds ridiculous," Peashy says to me.

"Your outfit is ridiculous," I say to her.

Meanwhile, NISA's just looking at me wide eyed. I'm not sure if telling her that I'm a hero that no one's ever heard of is good or not. "Wow! That's amazing!" Yep. It's bad. "I've never heard of heroics like this! It would be great to learn how I can help people like this!" I doubt people would like you if I taught you how to do it. "You must teach me your heroic ways!" Eugh! She just grabbed my hands suddenly and brought her face close to mine! Emergency! Emergency!

"Alright! Alright! Just get off me!" NISA backs off and I straighten out my coat. "I'll give you a quick run-down, just don't do that again. You grabbing me all of a sudden reminded me of a yandere girl I once met. Yeugh."

"I think I know someone like that," NISA says to herself.

"Well tell her to get a lobotomy." After I readjust myself, I look down at Peashy. She seems a little jealous of me giving NISA some tips about point-and-click heroics. Least I think so. Must be my imagination. "Now pay close attention you two. Because this information may save your life."

NISA gives me a salute. "I'm ready sir!"

"First lesson! Don't do that," I tell her. NISA puts her hand down and gives a thumbs up instead. "Okay. Second lesson! Figure out the puzzle you are in."

NISA cocks her head in confusion. "What's a puzzle?"

I think Peashy's giving a cocky smile and rolled her eyes at NISA for her not knowing what a puzzle is. Good. She needs to practice those expressions. "Well for point-and-click heroes, we need to solve different kinds of puzzles in order to get an item to let us progress. So, what item do you need to progress in your adventure?"

NISA looks at the board-sided table and crouches down next to it. "Well I dropped a stick of gum I was going to have, but I dropped it and it slid under this boarded up table. I can't reach it." She stands up again and looks at me.

A stick of gum? I could use that for that faux camera light I need to make. I guess the puzzle now is to just instruct NISA on how to get it with point-and-click mechanics. Should be simple. "Okay then. We now know the puzzle. Next, you…" Now we get to the puzzle mechanics for this puzzle. I'll just need to guide her into use some kind of item to get the gum. A combo item would be useful. First step, examine the environment. "Examine the store's items. Grab anything that you think could help you."

NISA gives another salute and zips around the corner store before popping back in front of us, holding a boxing glove. "I found this. Could it be useful?"

"Anything can be useful," I tell her. "Next you…" Let's see if she has anything useful in her inventory. "Check your inventory."

NISA digs through her jumpsuit and pulls out a thick stick. "I found this while venturing through Virtua Forest."

"Sticks are always useful. Next you…" Let's try combining the two things. "Combine boxing glove… With stick."

NISA grabs the glove and stick in both hands and inserts the stick into the open end of the boxing glove. She then looks at me. "Now what?"

Hm. Seems like its missing a piece. "Next you…" C'mon. There must be another item somewhere to finish it. Oh hey, there's another trash can over here as well. That could have something useful in it. "Examine trash can."

NISA looks at the trash can at the end of the corner store and points at it, as if she's asking if I'm serious. I nod and she walks over to it before digging around inside it.

I look down at Peashy. "Is that how I look when I go through trash?"

She looks up at me, disinterested. "Yep."

"Well good thing I don't have a sense of shame."

NISA pulls out a broken sword handle from the can and walks back over. "I found this."

"That can be useful. Now you…"

"No, wait," NISA points a finger at me. "Let me try it on my own now." She grabs the gloved stick and the broken handle and looks at both of them. She then pushes the end of the stick into the broken handle and finishes combining the item. She then holds it by the handle and makes a face like she's seen the face of the first goddess. She then looks at us again. "Look! I did it!"

"Indeed you did," I tell her.

"She could have done it a lot faster, though," Peashy mumbles to me.

NISA then looks at the table and the gloved stick sword she made. "Wait, how does this help me get my gum?"

"I'll show you!" Peashy cheers. She walks over to NISA and she hands Peashy the gloved sword. Peashy then reels the item back and looks at NISA. "This is what Train taught me at the eggplant farm." She then hits the side of the boarded table, making one of the boards break in two and another to become loose from the table. Peashy then kneels down under the table and grabs the stick of gum.

NISA looks at the broken table and the gum in Peashy's hand. "Well, I guess that's one way to get it. Not very heroic, though."

"It gets results," Peashy tells her. NISA reaches down to the gum and Peashy pulls it back from her. "Oh yeah. Candy Cane also told me that point-and-click heroes get an item when they help other characters, so we'll be taking the gum. You can have this back though." Peashy hands the gloved sword back to NISA, who takes it and looks at Peashy.

"W-Well I guess I can change some things for these types of heroics," Nisa says to herself.

"That's the spirit," I say to her. Peashy walks over to me and hands me the gum. "Thank you Pea." She gives me a warm smile and I look back at NISA. "I hope this lesson has been very informative. You can buy the full point-and-click heroics pack at twenty credits a month."

"I'll consider it." Can't tell if she was joking or not. "Well, thanks for the lesson anyways. You were a great sensei, mister Doeet." She puts her hands together and bows to me.

"Sure, you too," I say to her, giving a half assed thumbs up. Peashy just lets out a raspberry at her. NISA then walks down the street, carrying the gloved sword on her shoulder. "You think she'll remember that she stole a boxing glove?"

"I don't remember a lot of things, Cain."

"Same here, Pea." She hands me the gum and we walk back to the other side of the store to enact my plan. We walk up to the can opener and I take out the Tattletail doll I pocketed earlier.

"Hee hee he! Me Tattleta-ail! Me lo-ove you!"

I then turn it upside down and stick it under the can opener.

"Turn away, Peapod. This kind of disturbing graphic imagery would turn your stomach."

"Oh please. I played Mighty Number Nine and I'm still standing."

"You have a stronger stomach than me, Pea Soup." I then turn the can opener on and push the top part of the can opener on the toy's bottom.

"La, la, la. Lalala, la!" The can opener starts to tear open the plastic bottom of the toy. "La, la… La, la… Laaaaa, laaaaaa…" The Tattletail doll's voice starts to decrease in speed before coming to a slow, creepy crawl. "Laaaaaaaaaaaaa, laaaaaaaaaaaa, laaaaaa, laaaaa, laaaaaaaaaaaa…" The can opener finishes tearing the bottom part of the Tattletail toy and I take it out. I look into the bottom part of the toy and pull out the chargeable battery inside it, silencing the damned toy.

"Got the battery." I then pocket the now broken Tattletail toy and take out the gum. I chew it for a few seconds and spit out the sticky gum. I then stick the battery onto the gum and take out the white LED. "Now I just need to make this red to finish it."

"Ooh! Ooh!" Peashy jumps to get my attention. She doesn't need to try that hard. "I can do that!"

She has an idea on how to solve the puzzle? Doubt it but, eh. Would help boost her ego if she at least tried. I hand the white LED to Peashy and she pockets it before looking through the items on the corner store's shelves. "This should be useful," she says to herself, grabbing a spray paint can. She then takes out the LED and sprays it red and shakes it in the air to dry it before handing it back to me.

"Nice job, TV," I commend her. "You might actually become a great point-and-click hero, after all." She gives another warm smile to me. Okay, the big blue eyes and now that weird smile is making the back of my brain feel weird again. It feels like it's saying, "You've seen this before," but I'm not taking the hint. Eh. Just going to push it back like all the others. Emotions aren't something a hero should have. Save that for the side characters and give them to characters that aren't as well developed, like Pea over here.

Anyways, I tie the ends of the battery to the now red LED and it lights up, making my fake camera light complete. I then look up at the building and the balconies and judge my throw. I aim with my thumb, judge the speed of the wind, then I hand it to Peashy for her to do it.

She takes aim at the balcony next to Compa's caged one and tosses it at the speed of a bullet. It sticks to the balconies gutter and the light is still on.

"Nice job, Teapot," I congratulate her. She gives another smile and a thumbs up to me. Now I just need to tell C-Sha and that puzzle is solved.

Peashy and I walk back into the front of the corner store where C-Sha is still standing, who is now talking to Gust.

"And you said that these potions are tested and safe?" She points at the potions that are under the "For Sale" sign.

"Yep! Gust had performed many tests on them and has made sure that they are safe to drink and have no unknown side effects!"

"Okay. Then I'd like to take one."

"Sure. Just sign this waver form so that the court knows that any side effects from said potion are not by any means to sue Gust."

"Hey C-Saw." She looks up from Gust as she holds the pen in her hand and sees me and Peashy.

"Oh hello, mister Cain." She stands up to walk over to me and Gust scowls at me for taking her sale. "Is there anything you need help with?"

"Yes actually." I point up above us at the balconies and to the red light. "I saw an ASIC camera on one of the balconies above us."

C-Sha looks up from us and sees the small red light. "Thank you for the information, citizen. I shall take care of it, post haste." I wonder if she's going to go up to the apartment. Ah, I still don't have the grabber I need to open the side of the cage. Did I save? I hope I sa… _PEW! PANG!_ What the hell was that? C-Sha's suddenly got a blue arm cannon on her arm and was aiming up at the balcony. Seems like she shot the gutter with the light on it and busted it. Fortunately, it's not full of water. "Glad you spotted that camera. We can't let ASIC get the upper hand again. I'll have the guild send some repair men to fix that apartment's gutter as soon as possible."

Well I guess that works. Now Peashy and I have a way to get to the balcony. Now all that's left is to get the grabber. That "For Sale" sign should be useful. I walk over to Gust to grab it.

"The potions are for sale, the sign isn't." I should have figured she would see me grab it. I'll just need a distraction. Asking C-Sha would be a bad idea for the idea I have. I guess Peashy will have to do.

"Alright Pea. I need you to keep Gust busy for a second. Can you do that?"

"Cain do!"

"Don't say that."

Peashy walks up to Gust and grabs three of the potions under the "For Sale" sign and walks to the left side of the store. "Hey Geist! Want to see if I can juggle these three potions?"

Gust looks over at Peashy with a disinterested look on her face. "You break those, you buy them."

"Well I don't have any money, so there's nothing to lose!" I grab the "For Sale" sign and signal to Peashy that I got it. "Actually, never mind." She walks to Gust and hands her the potions. "I'll save my juggling skills for people that appreciate them." She then walks back over to me and gives me another smile. "Did I do good?"

"It would have been more impressive if you actually juggled." Least I got the sign. Now to put my plan into action. I look over at Gust and take out the sign when she's not looking. I then direct my attention to Peashy. "Now don't judge me for this Peacock."

"Ah Cain. I could never hate you." I stick the "For Sale" sign to her coat. "Loathing's different from hate, right?"

"Just stand over there, Pea Brain." Peashy walks over to the left side of the store, out of Gust's view. Now to put my plan into action. I walk over to C-Sha and get her attention.

"Hey C-Shark."

"Yes, mister Cain?"

"I have a crime to report."

"Is it Gust again?"

"Yes actually. She's selling an illegal product right in the public view. Such disrespect for justice!"

"Show me this product please." I direct her to the left side of the corner store and walk over with her. We come across Peashy as she holds the sign.

"Child for purchase! Half off! C'mon people! This is a grade A child here! Actually I got C's in home school, so…"

C-Sha looks at Peashy's display in horror. Maybe this wasn't the best idea. "That poor child!" I take it back. "Gust has lots of explaining to do!" C-Sha walks off to confront Gust and I gesture to Peashy to follow us.

We walk over to the front to see C-Sha grilling Gust at the counter. "Gust, you are under arrest for the illegal selling of children!"

"Gust has no idea what you're talking about! Everything Gust does is illegal!" She looks at me and points. "It's him that you should arrest! He's been loitering around Gust's store all day!"

"What can I say? I love to loiter."

"Either way, the child was holding a sign that was made by you," C-Sha said, snarling at Gust. "And that man there is a witness to you selling her. There's enough evidence here to send you to the Gamindustri Graveyard and leave you imprisoned there for the rest of your life, so if you could just come with me quietly, maybe I can cut you a deal."

Gust takes off running from the store. "Gust isn't going back to jail! Not again!"

She disappears down the road as C-Sha takes out a radio from her... Actually I don't know where she kept it. And I don't think I want to know. "We have a runner down Blonic avenue, heading towards Flicky street! It's Gust and she's running again! Take her down with extreme prejudice!" She hangs up and looks at me. "Thank you mister Cain. You're forever in the Guild's debt with the two crimes you helped stop today."

"I guess that can cover some of the debts I already owe them."

"I do need to take the child into child protection services though." C-Sha walks towards Peashy. Peashy backs up a little from her and I step in C-Sha's way.

"I'm her guardian." I grab her hand to try to calm her down. Don't need a panicking child right now.

C-Sha stops approaching and looks at me and Peashy. She looks a little confused until Peashy starts to calm down and grips my hand back. Got a strong grip, this one. "Well, I'm glad that you found your daughter."

"Oh, she's not my NGEH!" Peashy just stepped on my foot while I was talking! I guess her legs are also as strong as her arms. I correct my sentence to C-Sha. "Y-Yeah… She's my d-daughter." Peashy removes her foot from mine and gives a smile.

C-Sha also gives a smile to us. "Well, if you ever lose her again, please feel free to call me." She hands me a card of hers with her phone number on it. "Now if you'll please excuse me, I need to go find my friend. Have a good day mister Cain!" C-Sha then starts jogging down the street, leaving us and the now empty store full of junk.

Well it was nice to actually meet someone normal for a cha…

"Wait a minute, did I just get a phone number from someone that likes me?"

"I never thought I'd see the day," Peashy chuckles to herself. Eh, I'll just keep this in my inventory. Doubt it'll be that useful, but best to keep around for emergency. Now then. Time to get to Compa's balcony!

Peashy and I take the elevator to the apartment's floor, still holding hands. Actually, I let go after C-Sha left. Peashy's still holding onto mine. "You can let go now, Peapod."

"But it's nice, isn't it?" she asks me, looking at me with those big blue eyes again.

I flinch a little at seeing those again and pull my hand out of hers as the elevator reached the floor. "Not when your hand is being vice gripped." Hm. Her hand made mine warm. She must have hot hands. I walk over to the apartment door next to Compa's and knock. Since this person's gutter was shot out by C-Sha, we can pass ourselves as repair men and get in.

The door opens a little, still locked by a chain lock to the wall. "Yes? May I help you?" Eugh. It's one of those creepy silhouette people. Just seeing them makes my skin crawl. I have no idea how they can tell each other apart. Not that I find them all creepy. That's not why I dislike them. I dislike them because I'm afraid of one of them asking for money and I won't be able to find the guy that owes me. Damn you, Jerry.

I straighten my coat as Peashy walks next to me. "Hello sir. We heard that your gutter has been in need of some repairs? Well we're here to fix that."

The silhouetted person looks at us with what I can only assume are their eyes. "The guild sent you to fix it?" They then look at Peashy and raise something like an eyebrow. "Is that kid actually qualified?"

"How rude!" Peashy grumbles. "I'm twenty!"

"She suffers from dwarfism," I tell the thing. "If you'll just let us in, we'll fix it up, good as new. As best as we can. We'll take a look at it. I have some scotch tape." I mumble the last part of my sentence to myself.

The silhouette sighs and shuts the door. I hear some locks being undone and the door opens. "I guess you guys will do."

"Thank you, shadow person!" Peashy thanks them. We walk through the apartment to the balcony and shut the door behind us.

"How much does it cost to replace your bulbs?" I ask to myself. This apartment is just as black as that person. "Ah well. Now to just open the cage and grab the Core."

I take out the grabber and point it at the top of the side of the cage. I push a button on the control stick and the grabber quickly stretches forward and grips the top of it. I pull it back and the side falls down, still connected to the rest of it by some hinges. It clangs on impact and the grabber pulls back. I put it back in my inventory before looking at Peashy.

"Now Peashy, what I'm about to do is incredibly dangerous, stupid, and could even kill me," I warn her. "It's also going to make me look super cool, so only do it when you want to impress someone."

She gives a thumbs up to me and I climb onto the edge of the balcony. I balance myself on the edge and look at the side of the cage. It's only a few inches away, so I should be able to make it. I must admit. This is a bit terrifying. But a hero must always be willing to make leaps of faith to save the world. I guess this is one of them. "Welp! Nothing ventured, nothing gained!" I push myself off the balcony's edge and…

 _CLANG!_

Make it onto the folded out cage door. Landed on my knees though, so that hurt like a bitch. I turn to Peashy, who had both eyes covered but one peering through her fingers. She lowers her hands and I give her a thumbs up to show that I'm okay.

"Now you just wait there, Peacock. I'll go in and…"

 _Eerk._

"What the…"

 _Eek._

"Oh shit."

 _CRANG!_

"Not AGAIN!"

The side of the cage just had to break off when I was looking cool! As I fell, I can just see Peashy leaning over the side of the balcony, yelling my name. Little does she know, this happens all the time for me. Just need to quickly pull out the grabber and… PULL!

 _PANG!_

Whew. The grabber just grabbed onto the second floor balcony. Good thing someone in this building decided to own a hanging flower pot. I look down and try to figure out which way I should roll. Or maybe one of the passersby could be used as cushioning.

 _SNAP!_

And of course the grabber had to give right then! Land on my ass it is then!

"Wah! What the goodness?"

Well there's the sentence I usually expect when I fall from somewhere. Only thing that's missing is a shattered tail bone. It feels like someone caught me. I open my eyes to see…

"My goodness, are you okay?"

A peach haired beauty. No, wait. Everyone would say that if they were caught by someone like this. Let's see, uh… Cream colored cushion? No. Vanilla faced goddess? Maybe.

"E-Excuse me?"

"Not right now, I'm trying to think of a joke about your face."

I think she giggled at that. "Hee hee! Oh Cain. You were always the quick thinker."

Indeed, I am a qui… Wait, wait, wait. Did she just…

"I must say, I never thought I'd meet you again."

She…

"But I never thought I'd meet you like I did with Nep-Nep."

THIS WOMAN KNOWS WHO I AM!

I roll myself out of her arms, landing on my stomach. She tries to help me up, but I quickly stand up on my own and stumble back a bit.

Now, fair audience, you must be thinking, "Isn't recognition what you've always wanted?" And I must agree. But the difference is that right now, the only people that know me right now are those that I've stopped from taking over the world, are furious with me for taking something of theirs, and those that want to kill me. So I think you can see where I'm coming from when I panic when some beautiful woman on the street knows my name.

She walks up to me. "Are you okay, Cain? You look a little pale."

"O-Oh, no. I-I'm just f-fine! I just uh, f-fell from-m-my balcony!" The side of the cage hits the ground next to us, letting out a loud clang. The peach haired woman looks at the fallen cage door and back to me. "I… I was very clumsy."

"Do you remember me?" she asks, ignoring the fallen object. Weird question to ask someone that you met that fell from a building. "It's me. Compa."

Wait, this is Compa? I guess it makes sense. The "C" labeled hair band, hip bag, and heart shaped choker should have been my first clue. And now that I know what she looks like…

"I must say, I now understand what Peapod means when she said 'bouncy.'" I mean, how are those things staying in there? Is she even wearing a bra under tha-

"Hee hee. Classy as always, Cain." Oh shit. Did I say that out loud? "Reminds me of the time you called Nep-Nep 'Flatlands.' I think P-ko adopted that from you when we were friends."

Wait, did she just… "Hold on. Back up a minute. Rewind the clock." Compa stares at me as I twirl my hand around like I'm turning back a clock. "Did you just say, 'when we were friends'?"

"Of course. Don't you remember?" She gives a shiny smile. Damn. Peashy needs to step up her smile game. Compared to Compa's, hers is like a dying sta- "We were childhood friends!"

Well that stopped that thought dead cold. "Wait a minute," I say to Compa, holding my hands in the air. "So. You're saying. That you…" I point at her. "A cream colored sweater wearing beauty. Were friends with…" I point to myself. "Me. A guy with a red and black fashion sense and just fell from a building and tried to play it off like it's not a big deal?"

"Well there was also Iffy and Peashy," she says. "So it's not that big of a surprise."

"You know what? I'm just surprised that I even have a childhood. I mean, I can barely remember half of i- Wait, did you just say Peapod?"

"Ah! There's the funny nicknames again!" she says. Compa then grabs me by the wrist and starts pulling me into the building. "C'mon! I'll show you some old photos of us when we were in daycare! That should help jog your memory!"

Okay. I just have to say, this is the weirdest day of my life so far. First, I meet a ten-year-old girl who can punch like a bullet train. Then, I wake up in Planeptune's basilicom, apparently having been taken there by the goddesses themselves. Next, I slap one of them, end up finding a rare and world changing fruit, get that bullet train girl to be my protégé, fight off an entire eggplant army, defeat the woman that nearly ended the world three times, and now I meet someone that says that we were friends in daycare.

Compa pushes a button in the elevator and looks at me, holding my hand by her side. "This is going to be the best day ever, desu!"

It's certainly been a day, I te-

"Wait. Desu?"

 **So. I read the last chapter after I published it and thought to myself, "I could have done better." So I went and did better.**

 **I must say, after re-reading the last chapter, I was worried that the last chapter went by too fast and wasn't that puzzle heavy, so I decided to fix it with this one. More items and puzzles, better character interactions, more diverse characters, development on Cain and Peashy's partnership and the effects that both of them have on each other. Overall I worked on making this chapter better written than the last one.**

 **And I must say, I believe I have succeeded in doing that.**

 **So I'm glad that everyone that's following this is still sticking around to see how the story develops and hopefully you'll be looking forward to seeing how Cain used to be friends with Compa, IF, and Peashy when they were kids in the next chapter.**

 **BreadNotDead – It's explained in Chapter two that Cain calls people by nicknames that sound similar to their names. Peashy adopts that trait from him and the two call each other different names all the time.**

 **– The story's set in the Hyperdimension, as I plan to feature the CPU Candidates, but features Ultradimension characters and character history.**


	6. Chapter 6 - Cain and Compa

"This is from Iffy's sixth birthday party…"

A lot of weird stuff has happened today.

"This is from when we played with water cannons in the park when we were eight…"

I met a kid that ended up being the daughter of two goddesses…

"This is when I tried cutting your hair…"

I ended up slapping one of the goddesses…

"This is when P-Ko thought it would be funny to swap Nep Nep's pudding with yellow jell-o…"

I found a CPU Core that can make people into goddesses if they ate it…

"This was when we played house…"

Ended up going on a quest to save the world with the goddesses' kid…

"And you and Iffy were the parents…"

Sent a previously world ending terrorist flying after they were turned into a flying eggplant…

"And P-ko and I were the kids…"

And now…

"And you and Iffy…"

I'm sitting in an apartment with someone that says I'm their friend from childhood.

"Filed for a divorce."

Compa shuts the second book full of baby photos, snapping me back into the real world. I still can't believe this.

I have ended up falling into the arms of a beautiful buxom woman that says that we were friends and, after retrieving Peashy from the other apartment and having to explain myself to him, am now sitting next to her as she tells me stories of when we were kids.

"Well?" she asks, leaning over to me. "Do you remember anything yet?"

If you're confused, so am I. Apparently, she says that we met in a daycare in Planeptune's basilicom while the world was ending and became friends there. We were watched over by the goddesses and grew up there together. Even more confusing is that she says that Peashy, my ten-year-old partner, was there with us, along with some other girl named IF. We became best friends and lived there until we were old enough to be on our own. This was so weird for me to process. And the weirdest thing…

"You're really dedicated to this lie, aren't you, Samba?"

…Is that she thinks I'd fall for it.

Compa just falls back into the couch that we're all sitting on. I'm sitting next to her while Peashy's on the other side, munching away at some homemade cookies that Compa made for us. I refused and asked for something else, specifically the banana shaped CPU Core she had in her open kitchen. I'm surprised that trick actually worked. Now since I have what I need, I could just carry Peashy out and leave, but…

"Come on Cain. You should at least remember something!"

This woman's really dedicated to this lie. The baby books, the stories, and even somehow managing to get a kid that looks like a younger me in her photos shows true dedication. I don't think that just up and leaving will work.

Best I just humor her.

"Alright. Let's just assume that I'm your friend from childhood. Let's assume that Peepo was there with us despite being ten years old while we're around eighteen to twenty right now. And let's assume that we were adopted by the goddesses and were raised by them."

"So you remember?"

"You don't seem to understand what 'assume' means, Coffee. I don't believe you, but I am at least willing to hear out your convoluted story and see where the lie ends."

"I… Guess that works?" Compa shrugs her shoulders and looks at me. "So, where do you want to start?"

Alright. Let's see how well she can keep up with her story. "How about the exact beginning? Like how we were adopted by all powerful goddesses?"

"Oh, that's a good one!" Compa flips through the pages of the photo book on her lap until finding a page with four babies. They were all wearing onesies but with different colors. One was wearing blue, another pink, another yellow, and the last one in black. "Plutie took us in to Planeptune's basilicom daycare when we were all three. Arfoire was snatching kids up left and right, so we were kept there."

"Wait a minute. Pluto took us in? What about our parents?"

"We didn't have any. They must have been caught in the crossfire of everything going on. With no parents, Plutie and Nep-Nep had us live with them!"

Well I guess that part of the story checks out. But I have a pretty good trump card up my sleeve! "Well earlier this morning I was taken into Planeptune's basilicam and they didn't recognize me! How could the people that raised us forget about one of their own children?"

"Hmm…" Ha! Her stop to think proves that her story's false! "Must have been because you were gone for so long. Nep-Nep and Plutie don't have the best memories. One time, when I went to Leanbox for two weeks and came back, Plutie acted like it was the first time we've ever met!"

"Fine. I'll give you that one. A ditz like her would actually do that." Damn, does she have an alibi for each of her stories? "Alright, let's move the clock forward a bit. What was it like when we all grew up together?"

Compa flipped through the book again to a picture of the four babies, now around the age of five or six, playing in a park. "Oh it was great! Nep-Nep took us to the park, read us stories, and even played games with us." She flips a page where the four kids were now watching Plutia sew a doll's eye. "Plutie taught us how to cook, sew, and even make friends with other kids!" She then flipped the page to show the four kids standing next to Neptune and Plutia. The blue and pink kids were standing next to Neptune and the yellow and black kids were standing next to Plutia. It looked like a family photo. "We were all happy, living in the basilicom together. Even the other goddesses, Noire, Blanc and Vert, visited as our aunts. And if I remember correctly, you said that your favorite out of all of them was Plutie!"

I shudder at that last sentence. "Well I hope for my presumed past self's sake that I only liked her for her fear tactics. Hold on. You said that kids were being kidnapped during all of this?"

"Yeah," Compa said, sounding a little down about my mention of it. "Arfoire and a bunch of other baddies were kidnapping kids to try to make them goddesses. We were even kidnapped at one point!" She flips to a page with a picture showing the four kids hugging each other. "We were all kidnapped by the Seven Sages, but Nep-Nep and the others saved us. Well, me and Iffy. P-ko got away after punching her kidnapper."

"And me?" I ask.

"Well, it's a bit weird. You were the last to be found, but not by us." Compa points to the other page, showing the me look-a-like kid standing outside in the dark. "Nep-Nep and the others couldn't find you, so they were going to try again the next day. Then in the middle of the night, I woke up to get a drink and saw you standing in the basilicom's front yard. I woke up the others and ran out to you. Everyone was so worried where you were and asking you questions, but all you said was, 'I am the puzzle master,' and passed out on the lawn."

"Yeah, that does sound like something I would say and do."

"When you woke up the next day, Plutie took this photo of us all together. I also think that was when you decided to become a… What was it again? Click-and-point hero?"

"Point-and-click," I correct her. "It's not that hard." Sheesh. It's bad enough that I can't seem to find any faults in her story, now she's mocking my heroics. There's got to be something to make her slip up.

"Cookie, Candy Cane?" I snapped out of my thoughts to see Peashy lying across Compa's photo book, stretching out a cookie for me. "They're really good! Compa makes a lot of sweets whenever I'm around!"

I take the cookie and thank her as I nibble on it, continuing to think how to make her admit her lie.

… Wait a minute. "Peapo- ga hak guk!" Okay! Note to self! Don't make an objection with half a cookie in your mouth!

"Cain!" Compa pats me on the back as I coughed the cookie back up. "You okay?"

"Y-Yeah," I tell her, coughing the rest of the cookie out of my windpipe. I sit back in the couch before I start talking again. "Pah. Alright. I'm okay now. So, you said that Teapot was with us when we were kids?"

"Yes," Compa said, flipping through the photo book to a page with a bunch of photos of Peashy and the other kids. One had her playing swords with the blue kid, another with her being chased by the pink kid with a giant needle, and one with her and the black kid setting up a sort of trap on a door with plastic wrap. "P-ko was the same age as us when we were all growing up together. She was always a fun loving girl. She played with each of us. Iffy with her fighting practice, me with needing help to practice my healing methods, and you with your tricks and puzzle solving. She was the glue that kept all four of us together. Well, that was before she was brain washed."

Brain washed? I think even Peashy isn't buying this story, with how surprised she looks right now on the other side of the couch. "What do you mean 'brain washed?'"

"P-ko was kidnapped and was given a CPU Core for their evil plan. She was brain washed for ten years, fighting the other CPUs before finally being freed. She was saved, but with her being an immortal goddess now, she's stuck in her ten-year-old body while everyone else grows up."

Wait, she's saying that Peashy, the ten-year-old kid I met today, is a goddess? A ruler of a nation and one of the most influential people in the world? I look over at Peashy, who's eating a cookie and scratching her chin. She looks back at me and tries to say something as the cookie in her mouth falls onto her plate.

Yeah, I doubt that part's true. "Well how could Peapod even get a Core? Aren't they kind of rare these days? Like, 'super rare that trying to find them all in a week and betting your entire career on finding them would be suicide' rare?"

"Well Arfoire managed to collect a CPU Core and- Wait what was that last part?"

Ah shit. I did not just let that slip. Quick Cain. Think of a diversion. "Hold on, if all of this stuff is true, why don't I remember it?"

Compa looks down a little before flipping the pages to a photo of the black kid now in his teens standing alone. "When P-ko left and Yellow Heart was causing havoc, you decided to go look for her. Unfortunately, you disappeared and never returned. Even when P-ko was rescued, you never came back. We all thought you died and moved on." She closes the book and looks at me. "Cain. Do you remember anything now? Anything at all?" Peashy even leans in her seat in anticipation of my answer.

Sheesh, she's persistent. But I have to give her credit for covering all of her bases for her story. The photos and her explanations are well thought out. The only thing that sounds fake is Peashy being a goddess. But even with that last bit, being told that you have amnesia and have just met a friend from your childhood that wants to reconnect with you? Sounds almost too good to be true.

And that's exactly why I don't believe her.

"Listen," I say to Compa. "It's good that you have this entire story all figured out. And that you think that I'm your friend from childhood that has amnesia and doesn't remember over half of his life. But I still don't believe you. I mean, having your old childhood friend fall into your arms after thinking they're dead? Sounds like a bad fanfiction story." I laugh to myself and hop up from the couch. "Where's your bathroom? I need to let some old memories go down the drain."

"It's, uh, over there." Compa points to a doorway in the kitchen. "It's down that hall and is the door at the end of the hallway."

I thank her and go down the hall to the bathroom. Geez, that was really weird. I wonder how she knew I had forgotten the past fifteen years of my life?

~XOX~

As Cain left, I sat back down on the couch next to Compa. Oh yeah, I should say who this is again. It's Peashy again! Coming to you live from Compa's apartment! And speaking of Compa, she's currently looking towards the kitchen hallway that Cain went in.

"He really doesn't remember," she says to herself.

I decide to lie back in the couch and prop my feet on Compa's little table. Gotta stretch my legs out to reach it though. "Yep. His memories? All gone! Disappeared into the night sky like a bat that stole Neptuna's pudding."

Compa turns to me and straightens back up. "Hold on. P-ko, you remember Cain?"

I shrug my shoulders. "I thought it was obvious. Or our audience didn't notice the 'what-were-assumed-to-be-subtle' hints that I was making to show that I knew more than I let on. Hard to tell really."

"W-What audience?"

"Oh you have no idea how true that question is," I tell her.

Compa looks a little confused before looking back at me. "So, why are you with Cain?"

"It's a bit of a long story," I say. "So do you want the long version or the abridged version?"

"A-Abridged?"

"Can't tell if that's a yes or a no, but I'll take it." I sit back up straight on the couch. "So this morning, Neptuna and Ploot wanted to get some pudding or pudding pillows, I couldn't remember. I ran off to go on my own adventure and ended up finding Cain at an ice cream parlor. He didn't recognize me so I chose not to tell him that we were friends when we were babies because, you know, who would believe a kid right? So I sat down, he bought me an ice cream, we chatted, and he thought he could take advantage of me. Get that look off your face, Compa. He wanted to return me to Neptuna and Ploot for a reward. I knew that if he just returned me that there'd be a slim chance I'd see him again so I Pea Punched him in the stomach. Kinda forgot that he's not as durable as Neptuna so he blacked out. Neptuna took him with us back to the basilicom and he woke up. We chatted, he thinks that Neptuna and Ploot are my parents, and that I'm just some kid. I decided to just play up the kid act since, again, who would listen to a kid tell you that you're their friend from around twenty years ago and that you can turn into a goddess? Anyways, he told me about some puzzle, he solved it, and he found a CPU Core. Yeah, he said not to tell you but he pretty much let it slip so I'll just tell you. Neptuna and Ploot wanted the Core because he made Ploot mad and slapped her. That was awesome by the way! So we all argued, Cain made a deal that he'd find the Cores in a week, I became his persona or something, we went to the eggplant field, beat up Arfy, came here, shut down Gust's stand, Cain tried to get into your apartment balcony, fell into your arms, thought that you were lying about his entire past, ran off to the bathroom, and we are now having this discussion about what happened from early morning to now. Phew! Feels like I'm about to pass out after explaining all of that!"

Compa got up and went into the kitchen before coming back with a water bottle in her hands. She hands it to me and I chug it down. "Pwah! That's the good stuff!"

"So, P-ko?" Compa spoke up after I finished drinking the bottle dry. "You mentioned that you're Cain's 'persona?'"

"It's something like a partner or student, I think," I say as I toss the empty bottle away. "I wasn't trying to kill him like Neptuna and Ploot, so he allowed me to go with him. Now I could say that I went with him because I wanted to be friends with him again, give him better character development, and those are all true. But I also went with him to show Neptuna and Ploot and everyone else that I'm mature!"

"Mature?"

"You know! Like you and Iffy! Grown up, able to speak your mind, have people listen to you, get bouncy, fight monsters, not having to go to bed on time! I want to show that I can grow up and use big and dirty words like everyone else!"

"Um, wouldn't that be a problem with you being a kid?"

"Exactly! Like I said, I've been a kid for twenty years! And no one's willing to listen to you when you're a kid!"

"Then why don't you act like you're twenty?"

"Kids body? Hello? I can't talk about politics in a body like this! Actually, I wouldn't even want to talk about politicals at all. That stuff's boring."

"Then why not change into Yellow Heart?"

"Lack of shares, not many believers, can only transform about once a day, people only talk about how bouncy I am… Basically it's not the same as people talking to you. Unless you count the bounciness."

"Hm," Compa says before going quiet for a bit. "So you're traveling with Cain to show that you're mature?"

"Yeperooni!" I say as I give a thumbs up. "If I can show that I can go on an adventure like everyone else, and as a side mission make Cain not be a jerk anymore, everyone won't treat me like a kid anymore!"

"That… Doesn't sound like the best idea, P-ko."

"Hey! It was spur of the moment, Cain came back all of a sudden, doesn't know who I am, and I decided to take a chance! Not my fault my entire plan depends on a Batman Gambit!"

Compa and I sat on the couch together for a few minutes, with Compa lost in thought and me munching down on the rest of Compa's cookies. She should really consider selling these babies!

"Think he'll remember us again?" Compa asks.

I swallow a cookie before responding. "Who knows? Maybe he'll start to remember us as the week goes on. Or when he sees something that triggers an entire flashback sequence in his head, or if he's put into a life threatening situation and his life flashes before his very eyes. I'm betting on the trigger!"

Before Compa can tell me something about how rude I was saying that, someone knocks on the front door.

Compa stands up from the couch and walks over to the door. "Now who could that be?"

"If it's Lowee Scouts, tell them I'll have three boxes of white iced mint cookies!"

Compa walks up to the front door and opens it. "Hello?"

In a sequence right out of some action suspense movie, Compa's suddenly sent flying backwards and smashes into her coffee table. Her attacker then walks into the apartment and looks at me.

All I can say is, "So am I getting my cookies or what?"

~XOX~

I stared at myself in the bathroom mirror, going over everything that has just happened. It is true that I don't remember much of my past, but I just chocked that up to me taking too many whacks to the head over the years. But now that I've been told that I had friends and a family when I was young. It's really hard to believe.

Like, it's actually hard to believe that. Me, Cain Doeet, point-and-click protagonist that uses everyone else to further his own goals, had friends? Too good to be true. Although, if you count Peashy right now, there's a chance that could be true.

Actually, Peashy being my friend is a really odd thing as well. I just accepted to let her tag along with me and she likes to call me her friend. Eugh, whenever she calls me that, my stomach feels weird. Either it's the warm feeling of friendship, or gas. Bleh. 'Feeling of friendship' sounds dumb, so I'll just go with calling it gas for now.

You know, whenever Peashy smiles at me, I get that weird feeling in my head that I've seen her smile and eyes before. Guessed it was just because they looked like someone else's, but she does look a lot like the yellow kid in those photos. Is she actually that kid? Is something in my head trying to get me to remember her?

Nah! That's ridiculous! Peashy eating a CPU Core and being a goddess? Impossible. She would have surely done it by now on our adventure. And besides, we're trying to find all of those rare CPU Cores. There's no way she would have gotten one unless she was given one from another dimension. But that would just be ridiculous!

… I should probably go now. I wash my hands and leave the bathroom. Now I just need to grab Peashy and leave. The Core showed me that the next one will be in Lastation, so I guess the next puzzle will be trying to get a train ticket there. Maybe Compa would lend me some mon-

"Where is he, brat?"

What the hell? Is someone else here? I peek into the living room area to see what's causing all that noise. Oh crap, it's the grey chick again! Double crap, Compa's passed out on her broken coffee table! Triple crap, the chick's holding Peashy up and threatening her!

"Tell me where he is you brat!" The chick points her metal bat at Peashy's stomach. "Where is he?"

"I'm not saying anything until I get my cookies first!" Wow, Peashy doesn't seem to be phased by any of this at all. "I demand minty sustenance!"

Okay. New plan. Figure out a way to knock that chick out and save Peashy! And Compa too since she's there, I guess. First off, there's no way I can take her bare handed. There must be something around here that I can use to knock her out. Second, going in and being noticed would be suicide. I'm going to need to think up some kind of distraction so that she doesn't notice me.

"Shouldn't be too hard. There's got to be some useful things in Compass's bathroom and bedroom." I look in my inventory to see the card and broken Tattletail doll. "Maybe I can use this noisy toy as a distraction. Unfortunately, I ripped out it's battery so I'll need to find a replacement." Well there's got to be something around here that has batteries.

I walk back into the bathroom to see if there's anything useful in here. I open the cabinet under the sink to see if there's anything useful. "Toilet paper, wipes, plunger head… There's some toilet bowl cleaner fluid in here. Might be useful for later." I grab the cleaning fluid and look back at the mirror. "Wonder if this is one of those pullable mirrors like you see in those old TV sitcoms." I tug the edge of the mirror but it doesn't move. "The answer's either no, or, by looking at the key hole on the side of the mirror, it's locked." Well the key's gotta be somewhere in this apartment, just not in here.

I leave the bathroom and enter the hallway again. There are two doors next to me that I'm guessing lead to the bedroom and laundry room. I take the one on my left and find myself in said bedroom. Pretty cozy in here. There's a big bed that's in-between two large book shelves full of books, a laundry hamper that's full, a small desk with a lamp on it, and a closet. "Alright. Let's see if there's anything useful in here." I look at the large bed and inspect it. "A king sized bed for a queen." Not much there so I turn my attention to the hamper. "Who knew sweaters and skirts would fill an entire hamper? Wonder if the bathroom key's in there." I put my hand in the hamper to try to find it but no luck. "With how much fluff is in here, it's going to be impossible to find it." I pick up the hamper and put it in my inventory. "I think I just broke the audience's suspension of disbelief by pulling that trick." I then look at the closet and see a foot-tall syringe inside. "Then again, perhaps not."

I try to open the closet, but it's locked as well. "Does Copy keep everything locked? If so, I'm surprised she didn't put a lock over the toilet." The closet's locked with one of those dial combination locks so finding a key won't work. "Do her friends just go through her things without asking? Hold on there's a note next to the lock. 'Blue book. All four of us.'" Guess it's talking about her photo books. I see said blue book on top of one of the tall book shelves that are next to the bed. I walk over and look at the precariously placed book. "I could make this puzzle go on much longer by trying to find some combination of items to make a long stick. Or I could just kick it down." I kick the book shelf, causing the book to fall off. And hit me right on the head. "Maybe subjecting the audience to some convoluted puzzle solving would have been a better idea. Urgh." I shake my head and see that the book has landed on the bed. It's another photo book full of those color coded children. Except this time, many of the photos feature the kids getting in trouble or fighting each other. A lot of these even feature the blue and black kid fighting each other. Wonder what the me-look-a-like did to piss the blue coated kid off in all of these. Eh, whatever. I find the group photos of the kids together, and put the page numbers into the lock.

The lock comes undone and I open the closet. I then grab the giant syringe and put it in my inventory. "If this thing stabs me, it's going to be a pain in my ass. Eh? Get it audience?" ... "Hey, you try to make a joke about a giant needle off the top of your head!" I leave the bedroom and enter the other closed door in the hallway. I guess this is the laundry room. The washer and drier must have given it away. Not much in here except for a big sink and some hangers. I look back in my inventory at the full clothes hamper. "With how much fluff is in there, you could mistake it for an R-18 story. There's no way I'd be able to find the key by hand." I think most of this stuff might be cotton. Hey, that gives me an idea. I dump the clothes into the sink and soak them before putting them back and throwing them into the dryer. I then turn to the dryer's controller knobs. "Let's see. Put the heat on high, speed on high, set timer, and…" I turn the dryer on and after a few seconds, the timer goes off. I open the dryer to see the clothes have shrunken down. "Wonder if that fairy needs new clothes." I sift through the now shrunken clothes and find the key to the mirror cabinet. "Perfect! Hopefully I can find something useful behind that mirror. Just hope it's not another mirror world again."

I walk back into the bathroom and unlock the mirror. I pull it back to find a bunch of medicine bottles, toothbrushes, floss, and an electric razor. "I guess even anime girls aren't immune to human biology. Let's see if it's on." I grab it and push the power button. Nothing happens. "Great. Now what?" I pocket the razor and think on what to do. I remember the lamp and get an idea. I walk back into the bedroom and approach the lamp and take off the cover, revealing the lit up bulb. "Well I've done dumber things." I take out the razor and smash the bulb. Gyah, that stings! I pull back and the razor turns on in my hands. "B-b-b-b-b-batteries ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-charged." I take out the razor's batteries and plug them into the Tattletail doll.

"Tattleta-a-ail! That's me!" The doll springs back to metaphorical life.

"Tattletail, are you ready to risk your life for a kid in a bee colored coat and a well-endowed woman in a sweater that's two sizes too small for her?"

"Me hungry!"

"I'll take that as a yes." I pocket the powered up toy and walk back to the kitchen door. Compa's still passed out and Peashy's still being held up by the grey chick.

"Come on you little shit! Tell me where that bastard went and I'll go easy on you!"

"I'll never sell out my friends! Except for a box of Lowee mint cookies!" Even in the face of danger, the kid's still dense. I take the Tattletail toy out from my inventory and toss it towards the balcony doors. I hide back in the hallway as the toy hits the ground.

"Ah!" the toy yells out as it hit the ground.

"What the hell was that?" The chick drops Peashy on the couch and walks over to the toy. I peer out the kitchen hallway door to see her staring at the toy. "What the hell is this thing?"

"Give me a treat! Give me a treat!"

"Shut up! What the hell's this stupid thing anyway?" The toy keeps demanding for a treat, distracting the grey chick. Now's my chance! I take out the huge needle and creep up behind her.

"Give me a treat! Give me a treat!"

"Shut up! You're giving me a headache!"

"Need some medicine?" I ask before breaking the giant needle's glass over her head. She falls over on the floor unconscious.

"Hee he hee he he!" the toy laughs as she fell right next to it.

"'Need some medicine?' Really?" Peashy hops up and walks over to me.

"It's the best I could do on such short notice," I tell her. "Now let's go!" I turn and start walking towards the door. "We've got to grab a train to Lastation to find the next Core. Maybe we could pull a disappearing wallet trick on someone."

"But what about Compa?" I turn around to see Peashy looking at the passed out Compa on the splintered in half coffee table.

"What about her?"

"Shouldn't we help her?"

"Help yourself before helping other people, Peapod. That's another important life lesson for you to learn."

"Nice life lesson. I also have a life lesson for you." Peashy walks up to me and pokes me in the stomach. "Help your friends!"

"She's not my friend, Peepo! She's some woman that thinks we were friends when we were kids! I'm not trusting someone who says that!"

"That makes it a bit difficult for me then," Peashy mumbles.

"What was that?"

"I said, we're helping her, Pain!"

"No we're not! We're leaving! And nothing you can do will-HYAK!" Peashy just sucker punched me again! But this time in the kidneys. Fortunately, with all the adrenaline I've had today, I'm still able to stand.

"Now will you help her?" Peashy asks, giving me a mean scowl.

"F-Fine. We'll help her."

"Yay!" Peashy says, turning back into her cheerful self again. I straighten myself back up and look at the rest of the apartment. The front door's hinges are busted and it looks like it's about to fall at any moment. As for Compa, she's still lying on her back on the splintered coffee table.

I walk over to her and inspect her. "Hey Tampon, wake up." I lightly pap her face with my hands to see if she'll wake up. She doesn't move. "Well she's still breathing, that's good. She's just not waking up." I stand up and look at Peashy. Maybe she can be of some use with this. "Hey Peapod." I walk over to her.

"Oh, are we doing those partner chats again where you ask me questions and I make jokes?"

"Yes, but this time, no water works. So, any ideas on how to wake up Coffee?"

"Give her the breath of life!"

"Last time I did that, my larger intestine was going to become next season's winter scarf."

"Then maybe she just needs a shock to the system."

I look over at the knocked out gray chick. "Do you happen to know who that grey chick is?"

"No idea. I debuted in the game after hers."

I look over at the thrown about photo books. "What did you think of Camp's story about us being childhood friends?"

"I think that if it was made into a film, it could be an award winner!"

"What kind of award?"

"A Razzie."

I think about what Compa said about Peashy eating a CPU Core. "Compa mentioned something about you eating a CPU Core."

"I eat a lot of things I shouldn't."

"That just raises more questions than answers." I guess I should start trying to wake up Compa now. "We're done talking now."

"Not yet! … Okay, now!" Now, how do I wake up Compa? Peashy did suggest a shock, but I don't think Compa has an easy to access defibrillator in her apartment. Oh, I've got an idea! I walk into the kitchen and look at the blender.

"Maybe a drink would work. I've seen it once in a game, so it should work in this game-like world."

Peashy walks into the kitchen and stands next to me. "What do we need?"

"Well from the game, we're going to need some clean, energized water, and some coffee powder."

"Sounds simple enough. I doubt we'll even have a long puzzle ordeal like everything else."

"I just hope it's not as lackluster as the eggplant farm puzzles." I grab the glass blender and put it in my inventory. I then fill it up with the water in the sink. "Water, check. Only thing is that sink water isn't that clean."

"Is it as bad as Flint's?"

"No, but it is a bit murky." I take out the cleaning fluid from the bathroom and pour it into the glass, making the water turn clear. "Adventure game logic at its finest." I put the clean glass back into my inventory. Now what would work as an energizer?

"Me tired," the Tattletail toy drones out.

Oh yeah. Batteries are energized, so that could work. I walk over to the grey chick and pick up the toy and look at it in my hands.

"So long, you weird video game reference," I say to it as I take it's batteries out again. The toy shuts its eyes and I drop it next to the unconscious chick. I walk back into the kitchen and take the glass out of my inventory and the batteries. I drop the batteries into the water and Peashy walks over. The batteries spark around in the water before dying out.

"Is that even logical, Rain?" Peashy asks.

"This is just one of those moon logic puzzles that developers put in to add more hours to the player's gameplay experience to fool them that spending thirty dollars on a point-and-click game was worth it," I tell her as I take the batteries out of the glass.

"Or our author's just being lazy and can't come up with a good puzzle sequence right now."

"That's what I said." I walk over to the kitchen cabinet and take out a can of coffee powder. "And this just confirms it." I place the can next to the glass blender and pop open the lid. "How much should I put in?"

"Enough to make Compa's hair stand on end, keep her eyes twitching for weeks to come, and give her paranoia!"

"It's Dunkin' Donuts coffee powder."

"Then we'll just have to settle for waking her up." Peashy grabs the coffee can and pours the entire thing into the glass. I set it on the blender and turn it on. In a matter of seconds, the lukewarm, battery charged and powder tasting coffee is done.

"Hope this works," I say as I grab the full glass blender.

"Yeah, there aren't any more puzzles to solve in Compa's apartment." Peashy grabs a funnel from one of the kitchen shelves and we walk over to Compa. Peashy sticks the funnel into Compa's mouth and I pour some of the coffee into the funnel. The coffee disappears down Compa's throat and we wait a few seconds to see if she wakes up.

She doesn't.

"She doesn't seem to be waking up, Pea."

"Wait, shouldn't we have helped her drink it down instead of just pouring it down her throat?"

"What do you mean?"

"I think you need to help her drink it, or else it could… Go down… Her…"

We both stop talking and look down at Compa.

"Oh shit!"

I start pumping her stomach and Compa coughs up the coffee. I help her up from the broken coffee table and Peashy pats her on the back.

"You alright?" I ask her.

"Y-Yeah," Compa answers as she holds her head. "W-What happened?"

"Oh no!" Peashy says. "Compa's got anemia like Sprain! Quick! Where are the picture books?"

"I think you were knocked out by some grey bat wielding chick," I tell her.

"Grey? Bat wielding?" Compa manages to stand on her own and looks at us before going wide eyed. "Ah! Underling!"

"What about low class workers?"

"No! Underling!" She points past me and I look back. Just in time to see a metal bat nearly knock my brains out! Compa pulls me back, dodging the swing. I manage to keep my balance and Compa and Peashy stand behind me as the grey chick, who I'm guessing is named Underling, stares at me with red snake-like eyes.

Now that I can actually see her, it's not that impressive. Like I said, she's wearing a grey coat with some dumb mouse ears. In fact, a lot of her attire is grey, including her skin. Wonder if she has some kind of skin condition. The rest of her clothing, like her boots, gloves, and something that I refuse to call a top, are black. The only thing she has that isn't monochrome colored is her green hair.

"Hey, you prick! Don't stare at me like that!" Oh yeah, I'm currently trying not to die here. Best to focus on that instead of her fashion sense. "Now I'm going to give you two options. First option is you give me those CPU Cores and you can live! Second option," she pats the metal bat in her hand. "You die!"

"Boy, both of those sound great," I tell her sarcastically. "But I'd rather try to think of a third option." Well, I guess now might be the best time to figure out why she wants the Cores. Might not get another chance if I live through this. "Quick question, why are you looking for the Cores?"

"I'd have to guess that she's finding them for some other big and dangerous villain," Compa guesses.

"Ooh, I wonder what the main villain's real world gaming gimmick is this time?" Peashy jokes. "Does she represent gaming articles that talk about what are wrong with games today? Or does she represent nerds complaining about how their favorite games were changed into something that isn't the same as the previous ones?"

"Is there really a difference?" I ask Peashy.

"I'm not working for anyone this time!" Underling yells out. "In fact, I've got someone working for me this time!"

"And who might that be?" I ask.

"Ha! I'm not dumb enough to let something that important slip out!"

"At least not this early in the story…" I should ask what she's doing with the Cores. "What do you plan to do with the CPU Cores?"

"Isn't it obvious?" she says. "I'm going to become a goddess and destroy the CPUs!"

"Yeah, that's pretty obvious, Rain," Peashy says to me.

"Stuff it Peabody," I whisper to Peashy before turning back to Underling. "But then why do you want to find all of the Cores?"

"That's for me to know and you to never find out!" Underling threatens.

Another plot relevant question pops into my head. "But how did you find me and Peashy? We stole your only CPU Core!"

Underling lets out a laugh. "Only Core? I've still got one with me!" She sticks a hand into her coat and pulls out an orange shaped CPU Core. "This baby showed me where to find you! So if you want to sleep soundly without worrying about me breaking your skulls as you sleep…" She puts the orange CPU Core into her coat and points her bat at us. "You'll hand over the rest of those Cores now!"

Well I guess that's all the answers I'll be getting out of her for now. Now would be a good time to try out an intimidation tactic. "Now hold on," I say to Underling. "Do you really think you can handle us?"

"Why do you think I can't?" she asks back.

"Because there's three of us and only one of you!" I answer back.

"Nngh…" Underling stops and thinks for a moment.

"Yeah! And you've only got a bat and we're unarmed!" Peashy says.

"Good point, brat! Sounds like those are good odds!"

"Oh, should I not have moved my mouth when I thought that?"

Nice job screwing up my fluke, kid. Let's try another one. "I'll have you know that this kid right here can throw a punch that rivals a seven wheeler truck driving into a building! So if you don't want your lungs outside of your body, you'd better leave!"

"You're really going to send out a kid to fight me?" Underling asks.

"Yeah, that doesn't sound very heroic, Cain," Compa tells me.

Well thanks for ruining another intimidation tactic. Very helpful. I've got one last intimidation tactic left. And I hope it works, or else this story's going to end early. "Quick question. Have you ever fought any of the goddesses?"

"Of course," Underling says confidently. "I've fought them all!"

"Have you ever fought Iris Heart?" I ask her.

"O-Of course," Underling stutters. "That bitch is easy to take down!"

"Have you ever beaten her with just one hit?" I give her a cocky smile.

Underling goes wide eyed at what I said. "W-What?"

"Oh yeah," Peashy says. "Cain slapped Ploot when she changed into her bouncy form!"

"W-What?" Compa asks, surprised at what Peashy said. "He did?"

"Yep!" Peashy answers cheerfully. "And not just in like a normal fight. He made her angry intentionally! And he still took her down in one hit! She didn't even get back up to fight him!"

I raise my right hand at Underling. "This is the hand that took down the fiercest creature in Gamindustri! The hand that slapped nightmare fuel incarnate and lived!" I start walking towards Underling and she starts walking backwards. "The hand that beat down a demon! The hand that struck the strongest and most terrifying monster in this entire franchise's history!" Underling backs up against the balcony's doors and I bring my hand an inch away from her face. "Do you want to go up against the next Gehaburn? Do you!?"

"I-I'm not sc-scared!" Underling stammers. "I-I can still t-take you down!"

"If that's so," I reel my hand back, ready to swing it at her. "Then I get the first move!"

Her eyes go wide as she looks at me pull back. "T-The enemy flees!" Underling then darts past me and dashes out of the room, leaving the building.

I lower my hand and look back at Compa and Peashy. I readjust my coat and let out a pent up breath. "Phew! Glad she bought it. Really would have been bad if she didn't."

"You're going to milk that slap as long as you can, are you?" Peashy asks, walking up to me.

"If saying that gets me free drinks at the bar, then yes," I say to her as I pat her on the head. I then look over at Compa, who seems a little on edge with everything that's happened. "You okay, Toffee?"

Compa looks at me, surprised that I asked her that question. "Y-Yeah, yeah. H-Honestly, I thought that you were going to just up and leave me with Underling."

"Leave it to this kid to stop that from happening. Ha ha-GYOW!" Peashy stomped on my foot! "I told you to stop doing that!" I tell her as I hold my foot in my hands.

"And I told you to stop calling me 'kid,' but there it was," Peashy says sarcastically. Never expected her to understand that.

"U-Umm…" I turn back to Compa, who is now twirling some of her hair on one of her fingers and is looking down. "I-I know you don't remember me, Cain. A-And with everything that happened, b-but…"

"If you're going to confess your love to me, I'm going to have to deny it," I tell Compa. "I mean, there's a child present. And making out in like one of those adult doujins is not my style."

"You dummy; she wants to ask if you want to be friends!" Peashy exclaims, lightly punching my leg.

"R-Right." Damn, even when she tries to throw a light punch, she still hits like a truck. I stagger over to Compa and hold out my hand to her. She looks at it and me before moving her hand over to mine. "Just so you know, I still don't believe in your hokey story about us being friends from childhood." Peashy slaps me on the back and glares at me. "But I guess we can be friends."

Compa's face lights up like a Vertmas tree and she shakes my hand in glee. "Thanks, Cain! I know that after today, we'll be best friends agai-"

"Also, I won't be paying for all of this." Peashy punches me in the stomach.

~XOX~

So after we woke up Cain, he explained what he and Peashy were doing and their quest to find all of the CPU Cores. He also told me about the bet he has with Nep-Nep and everyone else. I thought it was ridiculous, and Peashy actually agreed with me, calling him dumb for making it. But as usual, Cain wanted to show up Nep-Nep and everyone else. Reminds me of when he and Iffy fought over who was better at understanding Nep-Nep's chicken scratch when they went to get groceries.

Cain told me that he and Peashy needed to get to Lastation to find the next CPU Core, so I bought them some tickets to a train so that they can travel overnight there. Cain was actually surprised that I helped him buy the tickets. He said he was going to try to make a makeshift fishing rod and have Peashy distract Mister Badd so that he can snatch his wallet. Sounded just like his old tricks he and P-ko used to play on everyone.

Peashy was even up for it. It's cute that she still acts the same way she did all those years ago. I don't know if her plan to be treated like an adult will work, but I hope it turns out well for her in the end.

I still hope that Cain's memories will return when he gets back. It would be nice for all of us to be together like old times. He does look at Peashy and says that her eyes give him a headache, so maybe there's a chance. Hopefully.

I bid Cain and Peashy farewell at the train station, giving Peashy a hug and Cain a hand shake. He said that he's not that comfortable with hugs, which surprised me. He was always very affectionate to us when we were kids. Wonder if he grew out of it or it's just the amnesia. As the train left, I waved goodbye to them and Peashy waved back as Cain gave me a small two fingered salute.

After they left, I took out my phone and called Iffy. She might like to hear about me finding Cain and would want to hear about it.

"Hello?" Iffy says over the phone.

"Hey Iffy! It's Compa. You'll never guess what happened to me today!"

"Did Neptune go through all your stuff again?"

"No. I actually found Cain! Remember him from when we were kids? He's still alive!"

"Wait, Cain? You found him?"

"Yeah! He told me all about this adventure he's going on and-"

"Sorry to interrupt Compa, but is he still with you?"

"Nope. He had to go on this big adventure he has with P-ko to Lastation. It's actually kind of funny. P-ko said that she wants to-"

"He's going to Lastation? How's he getting there!?"

"I bought him and Peashy two tickets to the P-Station-1 train. They'll be riding it all night down to Lastation Center."

"P-Station-1?! Sorry Compa, but I've got to go meet up with him!"

"Oh! Are you going to go say 'hi' to him?"

"Something like that. Anyways, I've gotta go Compa! I need to catch the train before it heads off to Lastation!"

"Okay, Iffy! Hope you meet him!" I was about to hang up before I remembered Cain's amnesia. "Oh yeah. Forgot to tell you. Cain has amne-" Iffy hung up before I could tell her about Cain's condition. Oh well.

I hope that when Iffy catches up with Cain, she can help with his memories and that they become good friends again!

* * *

 **Well this chapter took quite a while! Had to do a bunch of rewrites to keep the characters the same. Hope you all enjoyed this character development and puzzle light chapter!**

 **Again, reviews are appreciated and help a lot! Next time, a Peashy centric chapter with IF!**


	7. Chapter 7 - Peashy and Train

After Cain and I got on the train, we got in our seats and road to Lastation. Halfway through the ride, Cain taught me how to pick pocket people to get some important stuff for future puzzles. He used the people in the train car as an example, and everyone else got wind of everything that Cain was doing. Because of that, Cain and I are now sitting in our own train car. And by 'train car,' I mean the 'caboose.'

"Well this isn't how I expected this to turn out," said Cain as he sifted through the boxes in the small caboose.

"It's not that bad, Candy Cain," I tell him as I scooch an empty box into the corner.

"How's it not bad? We've been thrown into the back of the train into the car that's named after a mental deficient soldier."

"Well we've got our own train car. And we've got a great view of the rest of the train." I hop on one of the boxes and open the window. I lean out of the window and look at all the other train cars in front of us. "Those other heroes won't get a great view like this."

"Don't lean out of the window, you could get hit by a sign." Cain pulls me back into the car and holds me in the air by my coat. "It would be bad if your cute and marketable face was smeared across a 'train crossing' sign." Cain sets me down before walking over to an empty section of the floor we made. "I made us a place to sleep for the ride."

"Aren't you worried about sleeping through the train whistle?" I ask as I walk up to him.

"Have you ever heard one of those things in real life? It sounds like a plane flying next to your house."

"From that analogy, I'm guessing you once lived next to an airport."

"I never guessed you knew what the word 'analogy' meant, Teapot."

"I don't!" Cain shakes his head as he sits down next to one of the boxes and takes out a blanket we pickpocketed, or as Cain put it to the train police, 'acquired for important hero business,' pulls it over himself. I walk over and sit down next to him, pulling the rest of the blanket over myself. I think Cain has a smaller bit of the blanket than me.

"So Peapod. What did you think of today?"

"It was fun! Life threatening, people angering, yet friendship making fun!"

"Wait, when did we make friends?"

"You know! C-Shark, VISA, and Compa! They're your friends!"

Cain thinks for a moment. He's probably confused about people actually wanting to be friends with him. "Huh. I guess you're right. Wonder how I'm going to screw that up?"

I look up at him, confused. "Why would you say that?"

"Because I screw up everyone I meet. And not in the way you think, goddess no." Cain shakes his head when saying that. "At some point in the future, I'm going to do something that ruins their career, life, or mental state, so apologies for not knowing I made some people think I'm a good person."

"You are a good person, Rain!" I slowly shuffle closer to him while I'm under the blanket. "You taught NISA about pot-and-clonk stuff and C-Sha likes you!"

Cain looks up for a few seconds before giving a small smile to himself. "Heh. Yeah, I guess you're right about that."

I keep shuffling closer to him as I keep talking. "Compa also likes you!"

"Hmmm… Yeah, I guess she would. She might have me confused with someone else though."

Not really. You're the confused one in this case. "But she's nice though, right?"

"I guess. She doesn't seem like someone I'd like to have a beer with, on account that I don't drink, but she's nice I guess."

"Yeah, that's her entire character. Oh, and you also made another friend today!"

Cain turns his head to me. "And who would that be?"

"Me!" I finally shuffle over and push my body next to Cain. "I'm your friend!"

"Yipe!" Cain just jumped about a foot away from me, leaving me with the blanket. Cain looks a bit shaken from me suddenly jumping next to him, but after a minute he seemed to have calmed down. "Eh, just uh… Heh, sorry about that Peapod. I'm just uh… Not good with other people touching me like that. Sorry." After apologizing, Cain moved back over to me but didn't pick up the blanket.

Well now I feel bad. Usually, when someone needs a friend, you give them a big hug like in those superhero anime that Neptuna puts on for me. Then after that, they feel better about themselves. Cain though, I guess not since he's not… Well he is Cain, just not the one I remember. Ah Nep, now I feel like a jerk.

"Uh… I'm sorry too Cain. I just thought it would uh… I-I didn't know what I was doing. Sorry." We both sat silently next to each other for a few minutes until Cain moved closer to me.

"You can lay next to me since I didn't grab that old monster man's back pillow if you want, Pea."

I look up at Cain and give a small smile to him as I lie my head next to his side. "Thanks, Cain. Sorry about earlier."

"Don't say…" Cain yawns a little. "Don't say sorry too often, Peashy. Heroes shouldn't be sorry for what they do."

"Yeah, sure, yawn, whatever." Both of us close our eyes and go to sleep next to each other in the box filled caboose.

~XOX~

"Excuse me sir, but have you seen a man in red and black with a young girl that wears black and yellow?"

The man dressed in a jiu jitsu outfit shook his head no. "Negative. But have you heard about the Nep Saturn? It's the greatest-"

"Yeah, I've already got one from Vertmas, thanks." Five train cars already searched, and I haven't found either of them yet. I was sure that with the trail that Cain leaves everywhere, he'd be easy to find. By Blanc, when I find him I'm going to carve my initials on him with my katar's when I see him!

"Excuse me miss."

"Hm?" An elderly monster man just called me over.

"You said you were looking for a rude man and his equally rude companion?"

He made Peashy like him? Oh, that's even worse than having a thousand Nep's! I need to take her back to Nep before he makes her even more like him with how impressionable she is! "Yes! Do you know where he is?"

"Indeed," the elderly monster said, nodding his head. "He was quietly whispering to the young girl about how to take stuff from people without them noticing and was trying to take my back pillow." He leaned forward a bit to show it off before leaning back. "Fortunately, some train workers had him and the girl moved to the last car on the train."

"Thank you for your help, sir." I bow my head at him before quickly walking through the cars to the back of the train. Of course he'd be in the worst possible place. That's where he belongs anyways.

After making it to the caboose, I braced myself for my fabled encounter with Cain. The jerk that nearly ruined my life, my social life, and made Nep keep bringing it up whenever she gets the chance. It's been five years since I saw him, and for those five years I lived in peace. But now with him back, I can't just let him get away with it anymore. The stealing, the property damage, the angry crowds of people, the embarrassment… Not anymore.

I throw the caboose door open and realize my mistake. I catch it before it hits the wall and look at the scene before me. Cain is sleeping next to Peashy under a blanket together. That bastard, taking Peashy from Nep and Plutia like that. Hopefully the damage he's done to Peashy can be reversed when I return her. Then after that, I'll finally take care of him.

Carefully, I slowly walk over to Peashy as she sleeps. Even if he's asleep, Cain's dangerous to approach. He even scared off most of the other kids whenever I was near them. Even if he did say it was to protect me, he ruined my chance of making other friends. Heck, people even knowing that I was friends with him caused them to turn and flee! I was labeled a trouble maker for just knowing him! Gah, that guy's annoying!

I finally managed to get up close to them without waking them up. All that ninja training that MarvelousAQL taught me was actually useful for once. Looking down, Cain has a dumb snoring face on him. I remember waking up to that very same face nearly every week with how he climbed into my bed. Guy thought that he needed to protect his "maidens" or something, I don't know. Nep should have never left him with Vert and let him know about that stuff.

Eh, whatever. Shake off the past, IF, you need to get Peashy back. I kneel down next to Peashy and carefully shake her shoulder.

"Hey. Peashy. Wake up."

~XOX~

" _Miss Peashy! Miss Peashy! Can I ask you a question?"_

" _No, I'm going to ask her a question! Miss Peashy, over here!"_

 _Oh these simple people, always begging to ask me, Peashy, hero of Gamindustri, beautiful woman, and greatest goddess of all! Ever since Cain and I saved the world from Underling and gathered the CPU Cores, I've finally managed to be treated like an adult like everyone else. I even started my own nation! The Peashy Continent (trademark)!_

" _Miss Peashy, Miss Peashy! Over here!"_

 _I point at Famitsu in the crowd. "Yes, random harlot?"_

" _Now that you've become a full grown woman, what do you plan to do now?"_

 _I give her a sly smile. "Eh heh heh. With my status as goddess, I will make my own nation the greatest place to live in all of Gamindustri!"_

" _Ooooh!" "Greatest place…" "She's so amazing!"_

 _Heh. The crowds eating out of my hands._

" _Miss Peashy!" I point at Dengekiko. "How do you plan to make your nation greater while going against all the other nations?"_

" _Simple, really!" I lean on the podium, letting my large chest wobble, giving everyone a good view. "I'll release a system… That would need no successor!"_

" _Amazing!" "A new system that you only buy once!" "Are those real?"_

" _Peashy! Peashy!" The short reporter Abnes hops up and down. "How do you feel for having such a shameful body for a girl your age?"_

" _Shameful? Heh. Woman have you looked at me?" I step back and slam one of my long slender legs on the podium and lean my body back, showing off my voluptuous goddess figure. "I'm fabulous!"_

" _Amazing!" "Goddess quality right there!" "She actually looks like an adult!"_

" _Oh Peashy," Neptune says, standing in the crowd but near enough to the podium that I can hear her. "I should have taken you out on adventures more often."_

" _I shouldn't have called you a useless kid," Noire says, standing next to Neptune._

" _Rom and Ram could learn something from you," Blanc said, standing as well._

" _Even my godly curves can't compare to yours," Vert said, tears in her eyes._

" _Yes! Nothing can stop me!" I stand up at the podium again and hop on top of it, keeping my balance. "Peashy! The greatest hero in Gamindustri!" The crowd cheers for me, and I soak in all of their admiration as shares. "But, people of Gamindustri. I may be the greatest hero, but all of your kind words and admiration goes to someone just as great and awesome as myself!" I hop off the podium and look out at the crowd. "For this man has saved the world twenty times over! This man that has sacrificed so much for all of you! The man that has stopped several world ending plots before they even started!"_

" _Impossible!" "Someone else is just as great as Peashy?" "Heresy!"_

" _Neigh! It is not 'Hershey!' For this man has been my greatest friend! My childhood friend even! This man has taught me on the ways to become a hero! This man has believed in me when others just called me a child! This man is…" Drumroll please… "Cain Doeet!"_

 _A spot light shines down on Cain, who was standing behind me all this time. The crowd is surprised at his appearance, but are quick to let out some oooos and aaaas at his appearance._

" _That's her teacher?" "That's her friend, dummy!" "Let him speak!" "Yeah, let him talk!" "Speech!" "Speech!" "Speech!"_

 _I look back at Cain and smile at him. I move away from the podium and gesture it to him. "The stage is yours, my friend."_

 _Cain returns my smile and walks up to it, before placing his hand on my shoulder and rubbing it. Cain then looks out to the crowd as they cheer him on. This is it. Cain's moment. The moment he's always wanted!_

 _Cain inhales before he speaks to the crowd._ "Peashy, wake up."

 _The crowd goes silent, confused at Cain's words._

" _Eh?" Is all I can say to him._

"Peashy, you got to wake up." _Cain starts shaking me more, as he keeps telling me to wake up._ "Peashy, wake up. We've got to go."

 _It's at this point I realize who Cain sounds like. My eyes go wide as Cain turns his head to me, now looking like Iffy._

"Peashy, wake up!"

"Wah!" I wake up, sitting up straight and panting. I grab my chest to calm myself down. Aw, I'm not bouncy anymore. "Dang it, I'm awake."

"That's good Peashy." I look up and see Iffy, who was crouching down in front of me. She grabs my wrist and pulls me up as she stands up. "Because we need to get out of here."

"Huh?" I'm still sleepy and confused by Iffy suddenly popping up on the train, but I manage to keep hold of the blanket and drag it with me. "What? Where are we going?"

"We need to get you back to Nep and Plutia," Iffy whispered as she tiptoed towards the door. I just walked with her.

"What? No, me and Cain are supposed to go back to them once your adventure is over."

Iffy looks back at Cain, who's still asleep, before looking back at me. "Well you're adventure is over now. I'm taking you back to Nep before he gets you hurt."

"Hurt? No way, he's helping me!" I pull my wrist and stop Iffy from moving. "He's my friend! He's teaching me to be a hero! And in case you've forgotten, you're his friend too!"

"He _was_ my friend!" Iffy pulls me, but I don't budge. "Cain nearly ruined my life and make me the laughing stock of Gamindustri!"

"Oh yeah. The 'gum' incident."

"Everyone wouldn't shut up about it all summer! Even Nep brings it up whenever she sees someone chewing the stuff! Hell, I can't even chew it again after what happened!"

"Come on! Cain's not that bad!" I start getting louder to try to wake Cain up. "He found out an evil plot and stopped it! He's, almost, selflessly going on an adventure to save the world!" I start pulling Iffy harder, walking backwards while tugging at her arm. "And he's my… Best… Friend!" I let go of Iffy and she lets go of me, making both of us fall over! "Wah!"

"Gyah!" Iffy falls on her butt as I fall on my back.

"Gyeh, whut?" Cain wakes up from the noise, still a bit sleepy. "I'm sorry mommy, please don't get the whip out again."

"Cain!" I hop up and shake him, making him look like a bobble head. "Cain, Iffy's here, she's trying to take me away, and I'm pretty sure she's going to try to kill you!"

"What? Someone wants me dead? That's nothing new." I slap him in the face, finally waking him up. "Yow! Now that's a wakeup call!"

"Cain! Iffy's trying to- wah!" Iffy just grabbed my coat and pulled me back behind her! I fall down but get up to see Cain look at Iffy.

"Alright, Cain," Iffy says as Cain just looks at her, confused about what's happening. "It's time I finally finished you off!" She pulls out her big knives and points at Cain.

"I'm sorry, but have we seen each other before?" Cain asks as he stands up, still a little tired. "I mean. I've had a lot of people, and when I mean a lot I mean a LOT! Of people try to kill me. So could you tell me who you are?"

"What?" Now it's Iffy's turn to look confused. "You don't remember me?"

Cain shakes his head. "Nope. But it seems you know me, since you dress a lot like me."

I look up at Iffy, who still looks confused about all of this. "Oh yeah! You do look a bit like him, Iffy! With the big blue coat and the boots! You could actually pass off as a girl him, if you dressed like him!"

"Eh, she'd have to change the coat color black though," Cain says, looking at Iffy. "She'd also have to get longer pants, die her hair, get a snazzy scarf, and get a beanie. The green leaf bowtie would also have to go. If she changed all of that, she'd be a great twin to me!"

"Alright Cain, you know what?" Iffy said angrily, taking a battle stance. "I'm not going to wait to get Peashy back home before I kill you! I'm going to kill you right now!"

"Oh yeah?" Cain asked, crossing his arms. "I'd like to see you try, bitch!"

I guess Cain's in puzzle mode now, since Iffy isn't lunging at Cain and he's looking around. He looks at me and waves.

"Hey Peapod. You doing alright?"

"Eh, can't complain. Iffy here thinks she's taking me back to Neptuna."

"I am!" Iffy looks down at me angrily. "I'm just going to kill Cain first before I take you back!"

"That would be something if you actually did that," Cain said to her. Cain raises a foot before setting it back down. "If I take a step closer, IM is going to give the caboose's interior a new paint color."

"And if you try anything, I'll turn your lungs into a neck pillow for Plutia!" Iffy snarled at Cain.

"Hey! No listening to casual asides!" Cain yells back. Cain looks down at the floor and pushes his foot down on one of the boards. I can see that his side bends down a little but the end between Iffy's legs doesn't move. Cain hums to himself as he looks down at the floor before looking at me.

I give him an okay with my hand and kneel down at the floor and try to pull the nails holding the board up. Iffy doesn't notice me, but I can't pull the nails up. I stand up and shake my head at Cain. I'll need something to pull them out so Cain can surprise attack Iffy!

Cain looks around and looks at an open box next to him. He looks inside and pulls out a throwing knife. "I found a throwing knife."

"Do you think you can throw a knife?" I ask him.

"Probably," Cain says back. "If I can throw you around like one of those ugly dolls Pluto makes, I'm sure I can throw a knife." Cain pulls his arm back with the knife in his hand and throws it at Iffy. She ducks and it falls down to the floor, hitting no one. "I guess not."

"Oh, for that trick I'll make you eat that knife!" Iffy yells at him.

"It would be better than what they serve on the train," I tell her. "Their nuts made my tummy go nuts!" I walk over to the knife and pick it up. I wave it in the air at Cain to show him I got it.

Cain gives me a small nod and I kneel down to pull the nails out of the board that's between Iffy's legs. "So, Icky," Cain says, grabbing Iffy's attention. "What are you doing here?"

"I already told you! I'm here to take Peashy back to Planeptune!" Iffy yells at Cain.

"But then why do you want to kill me?"

"Because you nearly ruined my life!" I manage to get one of the nails out and work on the other one.

"Yeah, but I've ruined a lot of people's lives. Could you tell me how I almost ruined it? It's hard to keep track of how many lives I've ruined."

"What? You don't remember?" Iffy asks, confused. "Don't you remember the 'gum' incident? I had my head shaved on national TV! You don't remember?"

"Nope," Cain answers back. I got the other nail out, making the board wobble a little.

"Well if you don't remember…" Iffy raises her big knives at Cain. "Then I'll show you how it happened!" Iffy prepares to jump at Cain, but he slams his foot down on his end of the board, making the end under Iffy hit her between the legs! "Gyah!" Iffy falls over, hands between her legs. "Oh dear Neptune that hurt!"

"Peapod, quick!" Cain opens the back door and waves his hand at me. "Before she gets back up!" Realizing what's going on, I run out the door as Iffy gets back up. She jumps at Cain, but he moves outside and pulls the door shut, making Iffy hit the door face first.

Both of us cringe seeing Iffy slide down the small door's window face first. I'll just say that her face when it hit the glass did not look like it fit into the series art style and leave it at that.

"Well that was close," Cain said as he looked around the outside of the caboose. We're on a small wooden platform that has some guard rails, a metal ladder to the top of the train, and a long hose in a closed glass case. "Hey Pea." Cain calls me and I look up at him. He doesn't look that surprised about Iffy trying to kill him.

"Yeah, Pain?"

"So what was up with Inky trying to take you away?"

Oh, we're in an asking sequence now. I just tell him some jokes and offer whatever advice I think of when he does this stuff with me. "She was just trying to take me back to Neptuna."

"Why would she do that?"

"Because Neptuna can't let go? She seemed to think that I was kidnapped by you and that you were making me like you."

"Depending on the person, that idea can be a good or bad thing. So how have you been enjoying your first day of point and click heroics?"

"I feel cranky, listless, and for some reason I keep spitting up sawdust." I cough a little saying that.

"You'll feel a lot different after another day of heroics, Pea. For the sawdust, I told you that wood isn't food."

"You can't blame me for that! It's spelt the same way as 'food,' so I was in the right to try it!"

"For some reason, my stomach feels gassy whenever you say you're my friend."

"That's the warm feeling of friendship, Cain! The gas part is just you."

"I get the odd feeling that I've met Izzy before."

"How so?"

"Well for one thing, it feels like my head's going, 'hey dumbass, I think you've met her before.'"

So that's what remembering things when you have amnesia is like. "So do you remember her?" Would be an easy way to explain my age stuck predicament.

"Not sure. She seems to remember me and wants me dead, but then again a lot of people want me dead. Maybe I'll know who she is exactly sometime later." Cain taps his head when saying that. "Never know. Don't fall off the train, Treetop."

"Ah, thanks for saying that, Stain! Now that's all I want to do!" And thus, our small talk is over. Cain turns to the ladder and starts climbing it and I follow behind him. Cain stands up and helps me up, holding the back of my coat to keep me up with the winds blowing past us. "Pretty windy up here!" I yell over the loud wind.

"Just be glad you're not wearing a scarf!" I look up at Cain and see his small scarf's lose ends repeatedly slapping him in the face. I giggle and Cain just takes the scarf off and puts it in his coat.

"So what are we doing up here exactly?" I ask slash yell.

"Well, Indie is surely trying to break through the door behind us, so we'll just hop onto another train car and hide in there! She won't be able to find us if we do that!"

"Found you!" Iffy suddenly jumped up on the other side of the caboose and is now blocking the way!

"Damn, you're persistent!"

"She's also punctual!" I yell.

"Alright Cain!" Iffy yells. "Time I get rid of you once and for all!"

"And how do you plan to do that?" Cain yells back.

"Do you plan to throw him off the train?" I yell as a suggestion.

"Peapod, your suggestions are going to get me killed one of these days!"

"Like right now! Hyah!" Iffy suddenly rushed at Cain and took a swipe at him with one of her knives! Cain dodges right to avoid it and let's go of me, so we both lose our balance and fall off the train!

"Ow!" Fortunately for me, I fall right on the back of the caboose, but I don't see Cain anywhere. "Cain? Cain!"

"Over here!" Oh, he's hanging onto the side of the train for dear life! Looks fun!

"You doing alright Cain?" I ask him.

"Yeah, Peashy! Just hanging onto the side of the train for dear life while an assassin is trying to kill me! I'm peachy!"

"No, I'm Peashy!"

"Your word play humor is a light in the dark tunnel that is my li-" _PANG!_ Before Cain could even finish that confusing anecdote, a sign just hit him and took Cain with it! Not even a second passed and I can't see him anymore.

"Well that looked painful," I say to myself like Cain does.

"I hope it was." I look behind me and see Iffy climbing down the ladder. "But knowing Cain, he'll be back here soon."

"Yeah, that's what I'm hoping for," I say to her. I don't really need to worry about Cain getting knocked off a train. He's survived worse when we were kids. "Remember when he leaped into a Fenrir pen at the zoo to get your doll back?"

"Don't make me fond of him, Peashy," Iffy said, walking to the door. "Come on. I'm taking you to another car and away from Cain until he gets back."

"Um, I can't do that Iffy."

Iffy glares at me as she places a hand on the door latch. "Peashy, listen to your elders."

Oh we're doing this again. Great. "I'm twenty, Iffy! I'm as old as you! I can make my own decisions!"

"Not until you're taught how to properly make them!"

"Well Neptuna said it was fine for me to go." I give one of Cain's smiles at her as I said that.

"You know Nep, Peashy! She never means anything! Or at least she acts like she doesn't and in the end actually shows that was what her main goal was…" Iffy trails off a little before going wide eyed. "Did Nep set this all up to get us to connect to Cain?!"

I just shrug. "I doubt it. If she did, she probably wouldn't have let Cain hit Iris Heart. She also probably would have known that Cain has anemia as well."

"Wait, Cain's sick? Not that I actually care or anything, but you're saying he's sick?" I think Iffy turned into Noire for a second there.

"Well he doesn't remember anything about us, so I guess he's technically sick," I tell her.

"Oh for… That's amnesia, Peashy! Loss of memory! Thanks for making me worry about that jerk." Iffy said that last part a bit muffled.

"Oh come on Iffy! Cain's your friend!"

Iffy points her finger at me and gives me a mean look. "Listen here, Peashy! Cain Doeet, or whatever dumb last name he gave himself, was never my friend! The guy nearly ruined my life and my chance at getting into the guild! The guy's a jerk, uses people, doesn't care about anyone but himself, and he'll never be my friend!" Iffy gives a tug on the door latch as she finished saying that, but the door doesn't budge. "Huh? Ngeh! Stupid… Door!" Iffy keeps tugging at the latch to try to open the door but can't open it.

I think about making a joke, but remember Cain telling me something about puzzle sequences. Is this a puzzle sequence I'm in right now? Well Iffy's trying to open the door and can't, so I'm stuck out here until Cain gets back, so I guess so. Now what did Cain say?

Oh yeah, think about the puzzle you're in! Let's see here… Iffy's trying to take me away, so I should stop her from doing that. I guess that's my puzzle!

Now next step… We look for items that could be useful and combine them! Well I still have the throwing knife and the big blanket. Can I use them together?

"Nah. I don't think cutting a blanket is such a good idea."

"Peashy, what the Nep are you doing?"

"I'm solving a puzzle, Iffy! Don't bother me right now!"

"Geez, I need to get you back to Nep. She'll set you right with some good old JRPG lessons."

"Yeah, because I really want to spend hours of grinding again when the developers can't properly level balance the game's enemies right." I roll my eyes saying that and focus on the puzzle. Let's see… Maybe I can use the blanket as a parachute to send her flying? That would be a good idea! I just need something to work as rope for the blanket to pull her away.

Oh, the hose should work! I walk up to it and open the glass case. The hose just flops out of it coiled up, but one end of it is stuck to a pipe. I grab the hose and try pulling it off but it doesn't budge.

"Sheesh that's on tight! I can't just pull it off!" Now, what would Cain do if he can't pick something up? Oh yeah! Cause property damage! I take out the throwing knife and use its sharp tip to cut the end of the long hose off the pipe. The pipe falls to the ground and I put the throwing knife away. I then pick up the hose and put it in my inventory. "Cain's right! Coats are useful in more ways than just physically saying, 'I'm better than you' without actually saying it!"

I tie all four of the blanket's corners to one end of the hose and make my parachute. "Ta da! My first combination item! Now to use it!" I walk behind Iffy and tie the other end of the hose to one of her big coat loops. I then take out the blanket and walk up to the guard railing. "Hey Iffy!" Iffy stops pulling on the door and looks at me. "Do you want to see how you move a big annoying object out of the way with the forces of wind?"

Iffy looks confused at me. "Huh?"

"Then watch this!" I throw the blanket out and it poofs up, flying away from the train quickly, taking Iffy along with it! Well not actually, she's holding onto the guard rail with one of her hands. "Um, Iffy you're ruining my puzzle! You have to let go of the rail!"

"Gah! Peashy, why did you do that?!" Iffy yells angrily at me. "I'm trying to save you!"

"No, you were kidnepping me! That's way different from saving me! Now just let go of the rail and fly away!"

"Are you joking?! I'd be lost in the woods! Who knows how long it would take me to reach Lastation!"

"You've done it before! You'll be fine!" Sheesh, she's just not letting go. Let's see if there's another way to get her off. I take out the pocket knife and think about poking her to let her go. "Nah. I don't stab people. I break their ribs and let them stab themselves!" Looking down, I see the rail is being held to the wood by two big nails. Taking the knife, I start pulling one of them out.

"Peashy, what the Nep are you doing?" Iffy asks.

"I'm solving a puzzle, that's what I'm doing!" I manage to get the nail out and it flies off, making the guard rail loose. It wobbles back and forth as Iffy holds onto it. "Now for the next one!"

I start working on the one on the other side of the rail when Iffy speaks up. "P-Peashy! Think about what you're doing!"

"I am! I'm solving a puzzle! What did you not get about that?"

"No, I mean yes I know that but… Do you really think you want to stay with Cain on this?" I pull the nail out half way and look up at Iffy. "Do you really want to spend the entire week with a guy like that? Someone that takes things that aren't his! Someone that doesn't care for other's well-being! Someone that uses people for his own selfish goals! Do you really want to be with someone like that?"

I stop and think about that for a bit. Yeah, Cain can be mean at times. Actually a lot of the time, but he's only mean to people that deserve it! He also protected me and made me feel like I'm useful instead of just an additional character added to the series as some market ploy to sell more copies by introducing a new CPU and not really adding any character development for me! Yes, I'm still pissed about that! So yeah, I think staying with Cain is the best option!

"Yes, since no one else bothers to give me the time of day! And for that…" I pop off the nail from the guard rail. "Have a nice flight, Iffy!"

"Peashy, don-!" In a second, Iffy disappeared into the night, taking the guard rail with her. And with that, I have finally solved the puzzle! And on my own! That calls for celebrations!

"I'm gonna go sneak into the dining car and steal ALL THE CHOCOLATE! Ah ha ha ha!" I walk over to the door and tug on it. It doesn't budge. "Okay I guess not. Don't know why I thought that would work for me if it didn't for Iffy."

Hmph. Guess I'm out here for the night. I sit down near the edge and cross my legs and look at the scenery. Trees fly past me and the moon shines high in the night sky. Wonder if it's made of pudding like Neptuna says it is. Probably not. Probably something boring instead, like cheese.

Brrr, it's cold out here. I stick my arms into my coat and hug myself to keep warm. "Geez, no one told me that being a hero would be so cold."

"Heroes don't get cold, Pea. They only get cold with other people."

"Cain?" I turn around to see Cain behind the door, holding it open. "Cain! You're back!" I rush over and push my arms through my coat sleeves and hug him by the legs! Realizing my mistake, I stepped back a bit. "Oh uh, sorry about doing that again."

Cain looks a bit surprised but shakes his head before walking out and putting his hand on my head. "Nah, it's fine Peashy. I should be sorry for my actions, even if I am the one that's never wrong about anything." He rubs my head and I look up at him as he makes a small grin. "Just this once I'll be sorry for my actions. Only once though. Never again. Only now. Savor it."

I smile back and give him a hug again. "Thanks Cain. How did you get back here?"

"Oh, it was an interesting puzzle sequence." Cain and I both let go of each other and sat down outside of the caboose. "After recollecting myself from hitting that sign, I found a camp site nearby that had some strange girl with cat ears and a tail. Not the strangest thing about her though, that was the tan she had on her. Like have you ever seen someone in this series with a different shade of skin, it's bizarre!"

"Anyways, she was cooking this piece of rotisserie meat over a fire and she had a tamed Fenrir with her. I asked her if she could let me borrow the Fenrir to get back to the train but she refused. She said she had to get this piece of meat tasting just right for herself, but she was missing some ingredients. So I offered to help gather the ingredients for her in exchange for her taking me back to the train. We agreed, so I set out on finding the two ingredients she needed."

"First was some pepper. There was fortunately a pepper plant nearby but I needed to find a way to grind it. Fortunately, that weirdo Tekken was training in the woods. And let me tell you Peashy. Meeting a masochist after you… 'Accidentally…' Left her in a torture machine and actually being told 'thanks' is quite possibly the weirdest thing that's happened today. Apart from, you know, meeting the goddess brats and having someone try to convince me that I'm their friend from childhood."

"Getting back to it, Tekken was punching trees to train herself for some big competition, but she said that the trees weren't 'rough enough' or something like that. Holding back some bile, I offered to stick the peppercorn on the tree so that the tree would actually give her a challenge. Unsurprisingly she agreed and grounded the pepper into… Well, pepper. Had to scrape if off her hands though, so that was uncomfortable."

"After that, I needed to get some lemon juice. Again, there were different kinds of fruits ripe for the picking. Unfortunately, no lemons. Only limes and other acidic, sweet, bitter and sour fruits. Fortunately, through a convoluted system of mixing and matching, I managed to create a near exact replica of lemon juice for the girl."

"I returned to her and gave her the ingredients. She lathered and seasoned the large meat on a stick and rolled it over a fire for a few minutes before finally carving a bit out of it. Taking the bite, she gave a smile that could rival yours with how bright it was. She even gave me a piece for helping her make it. Since I knew what I used to make it, I just held onto it." Cain takes out a piece of meat from his coat. "You can have it if you want. You have only eaten cookies and ice cream all day." I take the meat and nibble on it. It's actually very good, despite being in a coat pocket for a few minutes.

"After that, the girl and her Fenrir ate the meat and thanked me for the meal. I asked about our favor and she agreed, letting me ride her Fenrir back to the train. She dropped me off at the second to first train car, but after running through the cars and dodging everyone that was throwing their stuff at me for earlier, here I am."

I swallow the rest of the meat and look up at Cain. "So you actually made a friend? All on your own?"

"Hm. Never thought about that. I guess I did! You must be rubbing off on me Peashy." Cain ruffles my hair as he says that and pulls his hand away. "So what happened with Itchy?"

"Oh, I solved a puzzle!" Cain's eyes shined when I said that. "I made a parachute out of the blanket and a hose and sent her flying! It was fun!"

Cain gave a big smile and clapped his hands. "Great job Peashy! I guess I'm a good teacher after all!"

"Yeah!" I say with an equally big smile on my face. "I guess you're rubbing off on me as well Cain!"

"Well depending on how people see it, that's either a good thing or a bad thing."

"Hmm… Let's call it a 'for the greater good' thing."

"Hey, that's what I tell people when I take items from them!" Cain makes his hand look like it's holding a glass and raises his hand at me. "For the greater good, Peashy!"

I mimic his hand and make it look like I have a glass in my hand and raise it as well. "For the greater good, Cain Doeet!" We both act like we're clinking glasses and drink imaginary drinks. We soon started laughing about how dumb we acted with each other for a few minutes before we just sat outside next to each other and watch the scenery pass by.

I shiver a bit from the wind and suddenly feel something cover my back. I look back and see Cain's coat on me and Cain sitting without one. He looks at me with a small grin and says, "I also guess that you rubbing off on me is 'for the greater good' as well, Peapod."

I smile at him as he stands up and walks to the door. "Wait, isn't that thing locked?"

"It's a push door, Pea brain." Cain pushes the door open and holds it for me. "It's not that hard."

I giggle a little and stand up. "Thanks Cain. You're the best friend I've ever had."

"Same here, Peashy."

We both walk inside to sleep the rest of the day away and get ready for tomorrow.

"Cain, your coat smells weird."

"If you wake up sick, don't give the hospital my credit number."

 **Hope you all enjoyed this chapter! Had to do a bunch of rewrites to keep it both comedy and character development for Peashy at the same time. Hopefully next time there won't be as many rewrites. You never know.**

 **If you liked this chapter, leave a review and tell me what you think! Next time, Cain and Peashy go to Lastation and meet Noire, Uni, and Kei! Along with everyone's favorite news reporter Dengekiko!**


	8. Rewrite Announcement

**So… Yet Another Hero…**

 **I'm… Kind of disappointed in it?**

 **Like, I had a lot of fun writing it and the puzzles, but I feel I could have done a lot better with everything in it. What does that mean? Well…**

 **I'm going to rewrite it!**

 **Yep! All the chapters that are currently released are going to be rewritten!**

 **So what's going to change?**

 **Well the biggest thing is Cain being raised by the goddesses in the Ultradimension, along with explaining what dimension it takes place in. Cain being raised by them sounded good in theory, but as I wrote it… Yeah, it was pretty unnecessary for including a character that over ridded canon (not that this story has anything to do with actual canon at all).**

 **Does this mean that the story's going to change?**

 **Not really. I still like the CPU Core collecting idea, so I'll be keeping that. The areas that they are collected in are going to be expanded a bit with some better made puzzles and character interactions though if I can.**

 **What about the characters? Are Cain and Peashy still going to be in it?**

 **Yes, and they'll still stay the same! Cain's still going to be a big jerk taking things and getting people mad at him, and Peashy's still going to be his joking, puzzle helping partner! But for their introduction with each other and their team up, I'm going to rewrite it so that Neptune thinking that Cain brainwashed Peashy makes more sense.**

 **As for the rest, I'll work on having them be as close to their canon versions as possible. C-Sha being called a police officer was mainly because I haven't played VII yet, along with Victory actually. So, I'll be working on making them all better characterized in the rewrite! Don't worry, Cain's still going to piss them all off, so you don't have anything to worry about!**

 **What about the puzzles?**

 **They'll still be there, but for some chapters I'll be adding some more items and uses to them, along with changing a few of them. The eggplant farm chapter is especially pitiful in its puzzles so I'll be changing that a lot.**

 **What about the scathing franchise insulting, audience mocking, referential and oddly humorous jokes?**

 **They'll still be included. It wouldn't be a Sam and Max inspired fanfic if it didn't have mocking and weird jokes.**

 **How are you going to rewrite it then?**

 **Well I'm not entirely sure to be honest. The first version, this one, was basically being written by the skins of its teeth. I'll be making this one much better focused, more focused on comedy and character, funnier dialogue, better characterization, and have better well written and thought out puzzles (well as best as they can be written in a written format anyways).**

 **But I hope you all look forward to the rewrite! And I apologize if many of you were looking forward to future chapters and are disappointed by this development. I just want to make an entertaining story with a unique character and Peashy, so I hope you'll all stick around for the upcoming "Lessons on Point and Click Heroics" (WIP title) rewrite!**

 **Also, if you want to see what else I've written, I've got a one-shot series titled "What If" on my account that you can all enjoy until I work on this one. If you have any interesting Neptunia fanfic one-shot ideas, send them my way and I might write them!**

 **Hope you all look forward to the rewrite and I'll see you all soon!**


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